Thanks to the ITHACA project, the national contest DIMMI (DIMMI di memorie migrant, Tell me of migrant memories) extends beyond the Italian borders.

Originally promoted in Italy by the Region of Tuscany in 2012 to raise public awareness and involvement in issues such as peace and intercultural dialogue, in collaboration with the ITHACA partner Archive of Migrant Memory (www.archiviomemoriemigranti.net), DIMMI has seen eight editions of a national Diary Contest and allowed the collection of some 500 written and oral testimonies which are currently part of a special collection of migrants’ diaries housed in the Italian National Diary Archive of Pieve Santo Stefano.

The main aim of DIMMI is to develop a new narrative of migration seen through the migrants’ own eyes and their multiple points of view.

This allows to collect and preserve a plural cultural heritage in danger of being lost in the country, and to contrast anti-migration stereotypes and hate speech through the direct narration of people with personal or family experiences of migration.

In 2024 DIMMI aims at reaching an international dimension.

The international call for self-narration stories will be launched in October 2023 through the ITHACA (www.ithacahorizon.eu) and the DIMMI (https://www.dimmidistoriemigranti.it/) websites. It will be addressed to people with migration experience in the Mediterranean.

Participants are invited to share their own autobiographical story (whether written, video/audio recorded, or drawn) in any preferred language by the deadline set in Spring 2024.

The jury will send these stories to local and/or international reading committees, including former participants to DIMMI Multimedia Migrant Diaries Project and ITHACA’s partners to assess and select the most meaningful narratives by July 2024, with a proposal for publication.