[Reader-list] 'Maps for Making Change' kicks off and you can get involved!

[Anja Kovacs]

*'Maps for Making Change' kicks off and you can get involved! *


After an overwhelming response to the Call for Applications, 'Maps for
Making Change: Using Geographical Mapping Techniques to Support Struggles
for Social Justice in India' will officially kick off on 3 December, at the
India Islamic Cultural Centre on Delhi's Lodhi Road. In this first workshop
in a series of three, participants will think through the potential of
mapping in the context of a project that they have suggested in their
application and the preparations they need to make to make these ideas a
reality.

 The list of participants in the workshop reflects the diversity of India's
struggles. It includes grassroots activists, NGO workers, artists and
researchers, and a dizzying array of issues: from fighting for clean rivers
and people's rights to livelihoods in the Himalaya, over unearthing the
socio-economic aspects and consequences of the construction of Bangalore's
Metro, to monitoring the national implementation of the Protection of Women
from Domestic Violence Act (2005); from mobilising slum dwellers to
critically engage with Mumbai's new Development Plan, over bringing
attention to human rights violations in Kashmir, to bringing into focus land
where internally displaced people can be resettled in the North East. And
these are just a few examples!

 But participation in Maps for Making Change need not be restricted to those
who are actually present in the workshops. Every one can get involved. The
Maps for Making Change email list (
http://groups.google.co.in/group/maps-for-making-change) is an open space
for anyone to join the debate on how maps can be used to further progressive
social change in the country. When the wiki is up and running in a few days
time (maps4change.cis-india.org), it will allow you to see the work of
participants as it develops, but will also be a resource on mapping for
social change as it evolves. And if you want to get a sense of what is going
on in the workshops as they unfold, that is possible too: we will be
tweeting on Twitter, using the hash tag #maps4change.

 So we'll be there – on Twitter as well as at Lodhi Road – from 3 December,
9.30 onwards. Hope you will join us on the journey.


For more information about the first workshop, please check
http://www.cis-india.org/events/maps-for-making-change-the-first-workshop.

For the initial Call for Applications, please see
http://www.cis-india.org/advocacy/others/maps-for-making-change.<http://www.cis-india.org/advocacy/others/maps-for-making-change>