Jan Nåls, Hanne Westgård, Kjersti Norrman and Steven Meyers
Compassion Revolution
Workshop
Compassion Revolution is a Nordic project that develops new pedagogy. The project delves into how compassion can be woven into filmmaking and education. In Mexico, Compassion Revolution will give an in-person workshop. Through practical exercises and activities, we place compassion at the core.
In the workshop we will introduce methods such as testimonials, compassion-based- interventions and simulations. The vision in Guadalajara is to create a space where we can learn compassion from and with each other, and to share our compassionate methods and exercises with colleagues from across the world.
Through our project we hope to make our schools more compassionate, and less divisive and tribal. Compassion is central in understanding organizations and leadership. Our students will spend approximately 100 000 hours of their lives at work - it is vital that their future work environments are compassionate. Compassion and empathy are also central in understanding our medium, the relationship with audiences and the impact of stories and film.
The partners of the Compassion Revolution include The National Film School of Denmark, Uniarts, Arcada, LHI, Westerdals and The Norwegian Film School.
Jan Nåls (Arcada), Hanne Westgård (Kristiania), Steven Meyers (LHI) and Kjersti Norrman (DNF) will be hosting the workshop.
Jan Nåls is an author, scriptwriter and scholar. His main research interests are storytelling and the functions of empathy across different media platforms. His Ph.D. from the University of Helsinki in 2019 examined the functions of empathy in intercultural visual narrative. A principal lecturer in film and media at Arcada in Helsinki, Finland, he combines scriptwriting and directing, both in fiction and documentary film. Nåls was the administrative coordinator in 2006–16 for a North–South–South exchange between in South Africa, Ghana, and Finland. He has visited many institutions as a guest lecturer, including FAMU (CZE), University of Witwatersrand, AFDA and University of Cape Town (SA), Den Norske Filmskole (NOR), NAFTI (GHA), ZHDK (SWI) and VGIK (RUS). Nåls has initiated two ongoing Nordic pedagogic research projects, ‘Konstforsk’ and ‘Compassion Revolution’.