Starting a Social Movement

 By Nate Feldman

Currently, in the Sociology class I am teaching at ELS, we are listening to lectures about how to start Social Movement Organizations, or SMOs as the lecture refers to them.  

People often begin social movements when they feel deprived of something or feel something in their society is unjust.  They find like-minded individuals who share these grievances and often form an organization to address them.  When these organizations begin actions, such as protests or speeches dealing with the issue at hand, a movement has begun.  

I can't say there's an exact movement I am planning to start at the moment.  For a long time, I've been interested in interacting with people from different backgrounds, and I definitely like the idea of getting people from different backgrounds to get to know one another and understand each other's cultures and traditions in a respectful way.  

One thing I'd be interested in doing is starting a summer camp where people from different nationalities can spend time together doing fun activities, such as sports, music, or art, while simultaneously learning about the places their fellow campers come from.  

Ideally, our staff will come from a variety of backgrounds.  I could imagine having a kitchen staff familiar  with the cuisines with the countries of our campers, introducing everyone to famous dishes from all over the world.  We could have small music festivals where campers play famous songs from their countries.  

Such a place would definitely be informative for people of different backgrounds, and it would spread awareness of other cultures.  

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