Students head to Mozambique for documentary

For a team of four college students, three of them from Florence, the opportunity to go to Africa for the summer will do more than quench a global curiosity. It will provide a means for Mozambican villagers to preserve their cultural heritage and tell their story.

Florence residents Tyler Jones, Kelsey Sherrod and Maribeth Browning, along with Nick Michael, of Memphis, will spend two months in Mozambican villages. It's their chance to learn about development efforts in the country while teaching villagers how to preserve on film their customs, rituals and daily way of life.

The group, leaving Monday, will take video cameras to the people of Nomba Village. They will return Aug. 1.

During their travels throughout Africa, they'll be filming a documentary titled, "The Kujilana Project." The film will allow the African people to tell their stories as well as help them gather footage of local stories predating Mozambique's civil war and the Portuguese colonial war.

"The Kujilana Project matters because it's going to give Africans a voice like they've never had before," said Michael, who attends the Church of Christ-affiliated Harding University in Searcy, Ark., with Jones and Sherrod. "We'll be handing them our cameras and saying, 'Take it. Tell your own story. We're not qualified to tell it for you.' "

Browning, a student at Samford University, met the other members of the group at Cross Point Church in Florence. Originally from Atlanta, Browning moved to Florence a year ago.

Each of the four has an interest in journalism and an even stronger interest in humanitarian missions.

The group met Kyle Holton, a missionary-in-residence at Harding, who co-founded a development center in Nomba Village with another American family. The center is called Malo Ga Kujilana or MGK, which means "place of reconciliation." The facility acts as a community resource hub that empowers Nomba villagers through various projects including fish farms and child-safe, fuel-efficient stoves. Holton and his family are entering their fourth year in Nomba.

The documentary team will partner with MGK to introduce film as the new tool for community development.

Browning, a journalism major, said the team is going to Africa not only to tell stories through their own documentary, but to listen to the people.

The students say their work is just the starting point. They all hope to continue in humanitarian work after graduation from college.

Jones said there is extreme poverty in many places there, but there also is a rich message to be shared with the world that's far different than what the western world seems to know and associate with Africa.

"Yes, there are AIDS and malaria epidemics and while we must continue to offer our help in those areas we have to look at the rest of the picture and see that few can read or write and as globalization has spread, their traditions are being lost and that's what we want to help preserve," Jones said.

"The long-term goal is to have a library in the village with Internet capability."

Sherrod said she wants her team to show the world the culture that western media has filtered.

"We believe development needs to be about creativity and imagination, not just farming," Sherrod said. "These people need to develop themselves and their relationships with others, and our hope is that the (three) cameras that we leave with them will allow them to tell their stories."

The team of students has raised $25,000 since December for camera purchases and continues to accept donations for film equipment through their Web site Kujilana.com.

When they return from Africa, they'll edit their footage and submit their feature-length, broadcast-quality film to various festivals.

The group's Web site will also feature podcasts of their work and blogs will be available there as well.

"This is kind of a forgotten area, and we just want to move behind the headlines and not just show Africa with all it's problems, but that there's hope there as well," Jones said. "This is a peaceful, Muslim village and before any programs can be enacted there, we've got to listen to the people."

Lisa Singleton-Rickman can be reached at 740-5735 or lisa.singleton-rickman@TimesDaily.com.