Spotlight on We Need Books

At WE NEED BOOKS

We Need Books, the intercultural library in Athens, is a very comfortable place. The atmosphere is soft, calm and warm. Children, adults, teenagers, speakers of Greek or other languages, from the neighbourhood or elsewhere, native or non-native speakers, find their place in the armchairs or sofas, around the dining room tables found here and there. Everyone chats in a low voice, studies, leafs through books or attends a course. The foreign language books are classified by language and labelled in Greek and English. Teenagers have a snack at the bar and then go off to exchange secrets in the tent in the youth area.

What is it that makes you feel welcome? How did you feel when you first arrived in France, Greece, Belgium; what did you need? These are some of the questions asked to recent and long-standing migrants, of different generations, and to social workers in order to identify the needs of each of them.

The project team analysed the interviews and identified themes with a view to creating an easy and enjoyable tool for communicating with newcomers and creating a first link in an informal exchange, in order to get to know each other by using the other's language. The tool also allows migrants to be informed about their rights and duties and to exchange on the values of the host countries. It is now being tested by the Eupheme team and will be refined over the next 12 months before being made available to the social and educational world.