Above: Rewind Project website

The REWIND Project has its roots in Detached Youth Work with young people on the streets of the West Midlands, partly as a reaction to Far Right influences on young people and also negative attitudes from professional staff around issues of ‘race' and identity . This work, although informal education based initially, has over the past five years also been used in schools, colleges and universities, youth services, police and other organisations, to date, in 70 areas of the UK.

The approach taken by REWIND is to attempt to expose the myths and falsehoods that are often used to justify the various forms of racism(s) that continue to blight our communities, with the biggest myth of all being that of ‘Race'.

Whilst REWIND do address issues such as identity, belonging, types of racism(s), types of extremism(s), attitudes to others, ‘Britishness', etc, the central argument used is the Deconstruction of ‘Race', exposing it as merely a social construct with no biological basis. Despite its falseness, ‘Race' has been used to justify genocide, slavery, maltreatment, mass murder, massive disproportions in socio-economic status and health inequalities. In addition to these, this illusional construct divides communities in present day Britain with the ‘fault lines' of ‘Race' simmering under the surface, ever ready to erupt when disturbed.

The most interest often shown by participants is in the DNA evidence that REWIND produces from the Human Genome project which supports the idea of ‘Race' as a false construct. Some of these have had their own genetic lineage traced through REWIND with some amazing results! In our view, this theme fits perfectly within the heading of Who Do We Think We Are? as many of us would be very surprised to learn of our SHARED common humanity and the various shaped and shaded people that make up our own personal heritages.

Written by Dave Allport
REWIND Project Manager

DISCLAIMER
The views and opinions expressed in the article featured above are the writer's own and do not represent the views of either the Who Do We Think We Are (WDWTWA) consortium of partners (Royal Geographical Society with IBG, the Historical Association and Citizenship Consultant Paula Kitching) or the project's funding body, the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF).

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