Information Keti Koti Dialoguebag UvA
(Update: FULL!)
Keti Koti dialogue at your Kitchen table?
The Keti Koti Table foundation cordially invites you to participate in the 2020 Keti Koti dialogue table event with the
Keti Koti Dialoguebag, including peanut soup and bojo cake which can be picked up from Tuesday June 30, in various cities in the Netherlands.
The Keti Koti Dialoguebag for home contains a ready-made two course meal (vegetarian: peanut soup & bojo) for two persons and materials for initiating and conducting a dialogue. This material consists of a Keti Koti Table manual and three envelopes with dialogue questions. In addition, audiovisual material will be made available online.
Eating together and having a discussion about the effects of the heritage of the history of slavery, on your daily life . Who will you invite?
Having a meal and an unusual conversation with your family and/or friends on your own kitchen table? On July 1st you can do this with the Keti Koti Dialoguebag. With an (almost) ready-made Surinamese meal and stimulating questions, the Keti Koti Table foundation challenges you to share with each other your personal experiences, emotions and insights which are related to our shared slavery past. This time these conversations will not take place in a large group but at home at your own dining table - in good company and corona-proof. The Keti Koti Table Dialoguebag can be picked up on Tuesday June 30 in various places across the country, including Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, Middelburg and Den Bosch.
The 1st of July (1863) marks the official abolition of slavery in the former Dutch colonies Suriname and the Dutch Antilles. This event is commemorated and celebrated each year in various places in the Netherlands during ‘Keti Koti’ (breaking of the chains). For six years now, the Keti Koti Tafel foundation has been organizing dialogue meetings to reflect upon this shared slavery past. With an average of hundred black and white participants, Keti Koti dialogue tables have been held around July 1 in various museums, city halls, universities, libraries etc. in the country. Participants engage in a guided personal dialogue with each other, sharing experiences, emotions and insights around specific themes that fit the occasion: racism and discrimination, civil courage versus silence, the position of black and white, identity and prejudice, and so on.
Unfortunately, these larger meetings are impossible this year due to corona-related restrictions. However, these limitations have encouraged us to bring the Keti Koti Table to the living room. Indeed, it does make sense to dwell on this difficult history and its consequences in that setting, too, because these have implications for the prejudices, stereotypes and implicit attitudes that we all share to some extent with each other. Addressing these together will help to fight the uncontrolled racism and discrimination which have led to the violent deaths of
people like George Floyd in the US, and of Tomy Holten who died in a police cell in Zwolle on March 14 after his violent arrest.
The Keti Koti Dialoguebagfor at home contains an (almost) ready-made vegetarian two-course meal consisting of peanut soup and a sweet boyo cake; a recipe for ‘tom-tom’ banana balls; a Keti Koti Table manual and an envelope with dialogue questions which help to guide the dialogue. On the evening of July 1, the Keti Koti Table foundation will facilitate and guide the dialogue via an online live-stream. For more information please visit our website page on the ‘Keti Koti Dialoguebag’. Due to financial support by the UvA Central Diversity Office we are able to offer the bag for free to the UvA community. Information regarding when and where the bag can be picked up will be sent in response to your registration.
The Keti Koti Table is an initiative of Mercedes Zandwijken (director Keti Koti Table foundation) and Machiel Keestra (Faculty Diversity Officer, department of Science, UvA). The Keti Koti Table dialogues at home are being organized in collaboration with Keti Koti Table Collectives in Den Bosch, Middelburg, Rotterdam, The Hague, and Amsterdam, and in collaboration with the honor students of the HvA and the UvA's Chief Diversity Officer’s team.
We are looking forward to bringing the Keti Koti Table in your living room and for you to join this valuable and necessary conversation!