At Wolkite University in southern Ethiopia, theatre students research another ethnic group's culture and then perform it on stage, in a course designed to ease ethnic tension on campus.
Crowds at a Meskel festival celebration in Ethiopia (EsubalewA / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0)
The Guardian reported in July 2019 that the university, founded about six years earlier, had struggled with clashes between its nearly 15,000 students, who come from across a country with more than 80 ethnic groups and languages.
Former lecturer Asteway Mellese described small disputes, such as a football collision or a quarrel over which group's music to play first on the annual culture day, turning into mass fights. Language was another flashpoint: universities teach in English, but some freshman Oromo students went on strike in 2018 demanding instruction in Afaan Oromo. Students from different regions no longer shared dormitories.
Mellese designed a course built on indigenous research and performance. Students spend two weeks doing field research on a particular ethnic group, learning about its food, language and concerns, and then write a play performed before the whole university. Some plays have gone on to national theatre festivals and television.
Yitbarek Alebachew, a second-year student from Hawassa, studied Gurage culture in Wolkite and wrote a love story around a Gurage wedding. Lecturer Abule Debebe said students who took the course showed more tolerance and respect for other groups.
According to the Guardian, the syllabus was later adopted by Mekelle, Adigrat and Aksum universities.
Sources: The Guardian