by Ellenore Angelidis, Executive Director/Founder
Peace is an enormous and important concept. It encompasses peace within, and peace without. Looking at the definitions again reminded me that it is really about so many different things at the same time.
Peace:
1. a state of tranquility or quiet;
2. freedom from civil disturbance;
3. freedom from disquieting or oppressive thoughts or emotions;
4. harmony in personal relations;
5. a state or period of mutual concord between governments;
6. a pact or agreement to end hostilities between those who have been at war or in a state of enmity
I first heard the concept applied to our work when our Anuak lead, Jekap Omod, shared that he believed our project was really a peace project. I asked him to explain because I was intrigued but skeptical. He said if the children in Ethiopia, from many different communities and cultures, get to read each other’s stories in their first language, they would understand they are the same as well as different. They would grow up with the same stories that would create connection and understanding. I thought that was a wonderful idea but remained unconvinced; that it was just too big an aspiration for us.
We started with a big idea: Positively increase literacy in a country of 110 MM now 130 MM where about half the population doesn’t get the chance to learn to read. That was scary enough. But like ideas that are meant to be, more evidence kept being put in front of me. One of our board members, Eyoel Ashaw, was excited to see the story of St. Yared in Anuak. He echoed some of Jekap’s thoughts without specifically mentioning peace. So, I started sharing that our books could be used for peace efforts, too. That felt adequate enough to acknowledge the contributions of two people I truly admire and respect.
But it really wasn’t. As I worked with Rotary on our reading rooms and bilingual book grants, both internationally and locally, I was reminded that peace is already a global focus for Rotarians. I began adding the fact that our books could support spreading peace in our grant applications, too. And it felt really good. I knew I needed to dig in more, but wasn’t quite ready.
Then last year, I attended the Frankfurt Book Fair, the biggest in the world. Our books were featured in the International Board of Books for Young People (IBBY) booth as part of the IBBY Honour List. Carolina, the Executive Director, was attending on her own so I offered to cover the booth for a bit to give her a break. She gifted me a copy of the history of BookBird. It started with its origins, which was the birth of the Munich Youth Library. Jella Lepman, the founder of IBBY, was asked to help guide the children of Germany post WWII. Her first effort was to ask the countries of the rest of the world to send their children’s books. She believed if the children of Germany read the stories of the rest of the world, they would all be connected. I heard echoes of Jekap’s words as I read. I was even more intrigued but still not convinced this was part of our mission. But it was exhilarating to think about doing something so critical in addition to the work we already do, which, after literacy, had already expanded to language and culture preservation, inclusion, innovation, and conservation. Our plate already seemed to be overflowing and perhaps even overly ambitious.
And then the world turned even more upside down. While we reworked our website,
I was thinking through how to capture and present the next chapter for OHBD and peace kept bouncing around in my mind. We had done a book on peace which seemed like a good place to start. I started a list of books that met the many definitions above of peace and asked the team for input. Turns out, we already had fifteen books. It seems we had adopted the peace focus after all and now just needed to make it official. So, we are launching a Peace Model Project in order to use our children’s books to promote the broadest definition possible. We are excited to integrate it with our other priorities because without peace, nothing else is really possible.
