Film’s power as a catalyst for change showcased in research project

The power of film to drive social and political change locally and globally has been explored in a University of the West of Scotland (UWS)-produced documentary project.

The award-winning Colours of the Alphabet, produced by UWS’s Professor Nick Higgins and directed by Dr Alastair Cole (University of Newcastle), is a feature-length documentary focussing on language and childhood in Africa.

The film tells the story of three Zambian children, Steward, Elizabeth and M’barak – and their families – over two school terms. It shows how the trio have all been raised speaking indigenous languages, and are heading off to school where everything is taught in English.

Professor Higgins, director of UWS’s Creative Media Academy and programme lead for the University’s MA in Filmmaking, said: “Colours of the Alphabet seeks to highlight the importance of mother-tongue education in schools, not just in Zambia but worldwide.

“Communities across the globe, including in Scotland, often speak one language but are taught another – and the impact that we see on Steward, Elizabeth and M’barak could just as easily be a child raised speaking Gaelic or Polish in a classroom in Scotland.

“The film really highlights the need for bilingual education and language support in education settings. We had incredibly positive feedback from our audiences, with 90% of those who attended screenings saying they would recommend the film to family and friends.”

With nearly 40% of the world’s population unable to access education in their own language, the film – originally released in 2016 – raises the question of whether or not the future has to be dominated by the English language.

Colours of the Alphabet was screened at 56 different film festivals, released digitally in 50 countries, translated into 40 different languages and its online content has been viewed 200,000 times in Africa alone.

The film won the award of Best Feature Film at the International Children’s Rights Film Festival in 2018 and Best Documentary at the Shungu Namutitima International Film Festival of Zambia, also in 2018. The film was produced by Lansdowne Productions and Tongue Tied Films, with support from Creative Scotland.

As well as producing a documentary in its own right, Professor Higgins and Dr Cole used the film as a research project. A newly published report has highlighted how the film and its release have impacted on its viewers and those who participated in its production.

The filmmakers sought to highlight the importance of mother-tongue education globally; to explore the capacity of creative documentary filmmaking as a research methodology; and to investigate mutually beneficial structure to enable collaboration between academia and the film industry.

Professor Higgins said: “The film really was multi-purpose. As well as hoping to spark conversation, change ideas and influence policy, we wanted the film to have a social influence too, helping the communities we featured and supporting the idea of language education.

“Having worked in film all my life, I’ve always known that it has the power to change lives, but this project, combining the academic with the traditional documentary film and distribution model, has proven how much further we can take that.” 

The film’s impact campaign was split into two, with a UK-focused cinema release and audience engagement project, followed by an Africa-wide impact campaign.

In the UK, the researchers undertook a cinema and engagement tour, with a launch at the Glasgow Film Festival. Screenings, many of which took place in bilingual communities, were accompanied by question and answer sessions with the filmmakers and local and national linguistic experts. A total of 1,200 people attended these screenings, with 60% of attendees saying that the film changed how they think about childhood and language.

The African arm of the campaign included a training programme for indigenous language subtitlers and proof-readers, resulting in the film being subtitled in 27 different African languages, with the film released through the Afridocs platform. The translation programme received more than 500 applications, and those who undertook the free training were then paid to subtitle and proof-read the film. The 54 successful applicants now have skills to take film translation forward as a career.

The training programme of online lectures and training materials is now available as an open source resource for the future training and development of indigenous language subtitlers, and the project has led to the establishment of the first African Film Translation Network.

Professor Higgins added: “Through this project, we’ve seen how academic film-making can reach wider audiences, and the impact that can have. I’m incredibly proud of the work that we’ve achieved, and hope that we can use this, and our learnings, as a blueprint for further work with a social focus going forward.”

The full impact report can be viewed online.

You can watch Colours of the Alphabet online now.