Listen to the Earth was created with young people, who wanted to address the issues of prejudice and hatred, who wanted to understand how we still live in a world where there are clear divides between communities, where cultural intolerance is still leading to violations of human rights. 

The programme is delivered in partnership by Oldham Youth Service and Oldham Theatre workshop. The aim of the programme is to use Holocaust Education to enable young people to learn and develop sensitivity and tolerance but more importantly to be role models to others in Oldham.

The project involves a 5 day visit to Poland, where participants have the opportunity to meet witnesses of the holocaust and their descendants and visit the Auschwitz-Birkenau camps. Before, during and after the trip, the programme uses creative methods of drama, creative writing, visual art and film making to produce work based on the young people’s experience and learning.

The ongoing aims of the project are to build leadership capacity within the young participants so that they can stand against bigotry, discrimination and those that would see us divided by race or culture and inspire other young people to do the same. We want young people to be able to draw the lessons from the past to create a better future. 

Since its inception there has been 145 participants who have taken part in Listen to the Earth, we have taken the opportunity to reflect on the programme and have created this video to demonstrate the impact and importance of the work.

The film you are about to see – is the story of Listen to the Earth told by participants from the past 12 years.