Purpose:
During COVID, the City of Erlangen, Germany, made a point of uplifting the stories of contributions by people with migrant backgrounds via their website and communications. These ranged from sewing and donating masks, to video keep-fit courses, helping neighbours to shop, telephone counselling, and cooking for the Erlangen hospitals. This is similar to the 2020 UNHCR video that uses a narrative of refugee ‘heroes’ but includes in the montage not only images of life-saving refugee doctors but also refugees going to the supermarket for elderly neighbours or undertaking other everyday acts of kindness. There is also a clear emphasis on host-refugee cooperation and shared humanity: ‘Because everyone needs help sometimes…’
Stimulus/Rationale:
The main idea was to uplifting the stories of contributions by people with migrant backgrounds with a focus on host-refugee cooperation and shared humanity.
Process:
The stories were collected by the Integration Coordination Office and shown via their website and communication of the City of Erlangen.
Impact:
By showing and communicating the stories of people with migrant backgrounds, Cooperation between hosts and refugees and shared humanity could be shown.
