Elephant conservation and indigenous experiences in Cambodia: Shaping environmental awareness through participatory filmmaking with young people

该项目将深化和扩大我们最初的研究“参与性电影制作和安龙翁和平之旅”的影响，该研究是通过AHRC网络的柬埔寨部分开发和提供的“概念验证”试点项目，该项目名为“改变故事：与5个冲突后国家的年轻人共建包容性社会”。Impact的后续供资将应用最初项目期间与两个新的柬埔寨伙伴--Bophana视听中心(Bophana)和大象生计倡议(Elie)--合作制定的成功方法，以扩大原始项目的影响范围，以应对柬埔寨环境保护和土著社区面临的紧迫挑战。在最初的研究中，我们发现参与式电影制作可以鼓励人们对柬埔寨战争和暴行的历史拥有所有权，并在分裂的社区之间建立对话和同理心，从而增强柬埔寨年轻人作为变革的推动者和受益者的能力。特别是，我们看到年轻人使用他们自己的电影作为草根宣传工具，在他们自己的网络中传播这些电影。虽然最初的研究侧重于柬埔寨年轻一代的冲突后和解问题，但我们的调查结果突出了有关冲突遗留问题、从战争过渡到和平以及对环境造成的损害，特别是在砍伐森林和野生动物丧失方面的重要未决关系。因此，这一后续资助项目的主要目的是运用我们成功的参与式电影制作方法，鼓励年轻人拥有所有权并积极参与保护问题，并增强社区对环境挑战的认识。柬埔寨四十年的冲突留下了环境危害的遗产，包括野生动物减少、森林砍伐和文化遗产的丧失，这些都影响了当地的森林管理方法。柬埔寨向和平过渡和随后的发展见证了不可持续的环境剥削和普遍的环境损害。冲突期间和冲突后的森林砍伐造成稀有和濒危野生动物的进一步丧失，特别是野生大象的数量急剧下降，因为它们失去了自然栖息地。土著社区与大象有着密切的文化和精神关系，特别是作为柬埔寨社会中的边缘群体，他们受到不可持续的发展压力，影响到他们居住的森林。因此，围绕大象栖息地的保护做法，以及与大象生活在一起的土著社区面临的问题，为鼓励柬埔寨积极参与更广泛的环境和发展挑战提供了一个关键场所。该项目是在与Bophana中心和Elie的对话中设计的，以补充每个合作伙伴的战略目标。Bophana中心致力于培养新一代柬埔寨年轻电影制作人，而Elie的使命是保护大象的自然栖息地，同时为它们周围的土著社区提供支持。通过招募12名年轻人，他们将接受共同制作和参与性电影制作方法的培训，该项目将提供3部可用作宣传工具的电影，通过实地访问Elie遗址，突出模范保护做法、环境挑战和被边缘化的土著社区面临的问题。这些电影将成为影响和传播战略的核心部分，该战略将通过在土著社区放映、面向保护工作者放映、提交国际电影节以及为年轻电影制作人提供社交媒体培训方案来传播他们的电影作为宣传工具，从而提高对环境挑战的认识。

This project will deepen and extend the impact of our original research "Participatory Filmmaking and the Anlong Veng Peace Tours", which was a 'proof of concept' pilot developed and delivered through the Cambodia strand of the AHRC Network Plus grant "Changing the Story: Building Inclusive Societies with, and for, Young People in 5 Post-Conflict Countries". The follow on funding for impact will apply the successful methods developed during the original project in collaboration with two new Cambodian partners, the Bophana Audio Visual Center (Bophana) and Elephant Livelihood Initiative (ELIE), to extend the reach of the original project to address urgent challenges for environmental conservation and indigenous communities in Cambodia. In the original research, we found that participatory filmmaking could empower young Cambodians as agents and beneficiaries of change by encouraging ownership of Cambodia's histories of war and atrocity, and building dialogue and empathy across divided communities. In particular, we saw young people using their own films as grassroots advocacy tools as they disseminated them across and within their own networks. While the original research focused on issues of post-conflict reconciliation for younger generations in Cambodia, our findings highlighted important outstanding relationships concerning legacies of conflict, transitions from war to peace, and harms inflicted on the environment, particularly in terms of deforestation and wildlife loss. Thus, the primary aims of this follow on funding project is to deploy our successful participatory filmmaking methodology to encourage young people to take ownership and actively engage with conservation issues, and to amplify awareness of environmental challenges across communities. Cambodia's forty years of conflict have left a legacy of environmental harms, including wildlife reduction, deforestation and the loss of cultural heritage informing locally grounded approaches to forest management. Cambodia's transition to peace and subsequent development has witnessed unsustainable environmental exploitation and widespread environmental harms. Deforestation during and after conflict has caused further loss of rare and endangered wildlife and wild elephant numbers, in particular, have sharply declined as a consequence of the loss of their natural habitats. Indigenous communities, who have close cultural and spiritual relationships to elephants, suffer particularly as a marginalised group within wider Cambodian society and subject to unsustainable development pressures affecting the forests that they reside in. Conservation practice around elephant habitats, and issues facing indigenous communities who live alongside elephants, therefore offers a key site through which to encourage active engagement with wider environmental and development challenges in Cambodia. The project has been designed in dialogue with the Bophana Center and ELIE to complement each partner's strategic objectives. The Bophana Center is committed to training a new generation of young Cambodian filmmakers, while ELIE's mission is to conserve the natural habitats of elephants while providing support for indigenous communities around them. Through the recruitment of 12 young people, who will be trained in co-productive and participatory filmmaking methods, the project will deliver 3 films that can be used as advocacy tools, highlighting exemplary conservation practice, environmental challenges, and issues facing marginalised indigenous communities through field visits to ELIE sites. These films will be constitute the centrepiece of an impact and dissemination strategy that will raise awareness of environmental challenges through screenings in indigenous communities, screenings facing conservation practitioners, submission for international film festivals, and a social media training program for the young filmmakers to disseminate their films as advocacy tools.