What does it mean to be human?

Through brainstorming and discussion, this activity leads participants to define what it means to be human and to relate human rights to human needs.

1 hour or 3 separate 20-minute activities

PART A: What Does It Mean to Be Human? (20 minutes)

1. Write the words "HUMAN" and "RIGHTS" at the top of chart paper or a blackboard. Below the word "human" draw a circle or the outline of a human being.

Ask participants to brainstorm what qualities define a human being and write the words or symbols inside the outline. For example, "intelligence," "sympathy."

2. Next ask participants what they think is needed in order to protect, enhance, and fully develop these qualities of a human being. List their answers outside the circle, and ask participants to explain them. For example, "education," "friendship," "loving family." (Note: Save this list for use in Part B)

3. Discuss:

    * What does it mean to be fully human? How is that different from just "being alive" or "surviving"?

    * Based on this list, what do people need to live in dignity?

    * Are all human beings essentially equal? What is the value of human differences?

    * Can any of our "essential" human qualities be taken from us? For example, only human beings can communicate with complex language; are you human if you lose the power of speech?

    * What happens when a person or government attempts to deprive someone of something that is necessary to human dignity?

    * What would happen if you had to give up one of these human necessities? 

4. Explain that everything inside the circle relates to human dignity, the wholeness of being human. Everything written around the outline represents what is necessary to human dignity. Human rights are based on these necessities.

Read these sentences from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and explain that this document sets the standard for how human beings should behave towards one another so that everyone’s human dignity is respected:

      …recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of the freedom, justice, and peace in the world…

                        Preamble
                        Universal Declaration of Human Rights 

      All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

                        Article 1
                        Universal Declaration of Human Rights 

PART B: What Is a Right? (20 minutes)

1. Brainstorm for the many meanings "right" can have (e.g., "correct," "opposite of left," "just.") Consider common expressions like "We’re within our rights" or "You have no right to say that." Record these different meanings on the board. What is the meaning of "right" when we speak of a human right?

2. In small groups or all together, brainstorm a definition for human rights and write these possibilities on the board. Try to evolve a definition that everyone can agree upon and write it on a chart sheet by itself.

3. Write on the board this definition of human rights:

      Human rights belong to all people regardless of their sex, race, color, language, national origin, age, class, religion, or political beliefs. They are universal, inalienable, indivisible, and interdependent.
    * What is meant by universality? By inalienable? By indivisible? By interdependent? Ask participants to look up these terms in a dictionary or in A Human Rights Glossary, Part V, "Appendices," and explain their meaning to the group. 

4. Look back at the list of qualities that define a human generated in Part A.

5. Write "SURVIVAL/SUBSISTENCE," "HUMAN DIGNITY," and "CONVENIENCES AND LUXURIES" on another chart or blackboard. Discuss the meaning of these terms.

Consider the chart made in Part A. Place each item listed as necessary to fully develop human qualities under one of these headings. For example, is education necessary to survival? To human dignity? Is education a convenience or a luxury?

6. Discuss:

    * Should human rights address only what a human being needs to survive? Why or why not?

    * Should human rights also protect those things you classified under "conveniences and luxuries"? Why or why not?

    * Some people in the world have only what is necessary to survive while others have luxury and convenience. Is this situation just? Is it a human rights violation?

    * Can something be done to equalize the enjoyment of human dignity? Should something be done? If so, how? And by whom? 

PART C: What Is a Universal Right? (20 minutes)

1. Read the comments of Eleanor Roosevelt, Chair of the UN commission that drafted the UDHR, on the importance of universal human rights standards:

      Where, after all, do universal rights begin? In small places, close to home – so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerned citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.

                        Eleanor Roosevelt
                        The Great Question, 1958 

2. Discuss this passage:

    * What do you think Eleanor Roosevelt means by "universal rights"?

    * Some people feel that universal values or standards of behavior are impossible. What do you think?

    * Why do you think the UN chose the word universal instead of the word international when naming the UDHR?

    * Paraphrase the final sentence of the quotation. What does it say about individual responsibility for human rights? What do you think Eleanor Roosevelt means by "concerned citizen action to uphold" rights close to home? 

Going Further

1. Introduce the UDHR, explaining that this document was intended to offer all people in all situations the equal justice, opportunity, and dignity of which Eleanor Roosevelt spoke. Then give a brief history of the UDHR. See Part I, A Short History of Human Rights for background information or use this as a reading.

2. Introduce the concepts of moral, legal, and natural rights. See Part V, A Human Rights Glossary. Are human rights necessarily legal rights?

3. Pose the question "What does it mean to be alive?"

    * When does life begin? When does life end?

    * Should the right to be living ever be taken away by the state?

    * Is the right to live a human right?

    * When do human rights begin and end? 

4. Discuss the relationship between human dignity, human rights, and the concept of "humane treatment." 

Have the students collaborate, in small groups, and create a scenario of someone whose human rights are being violated.  Have them list off the right(s) and then follow by explaining why these right(s) are essential to being human.  Take these scenarios and present them to the class as a whole so that different groups can identify the right(s) violated and why such right(s) are required for human beings.

What could we do if "x" happened within our community?--"x" being a human rights violation, which either has happened or could happen in the future.

Help students brainstorm problem-solving methods for human rights dilemmas within their community.

Variable

1.  Have the class, as a whole, brainstorm possible human rights violations which could, conceivably, occur within the community.

2.  Select the issue that is most appropriate for all students, if possible.

3.  Discuss how this specific human rights violation affects the involved parties.

4.  Brainstorm ways that the students could make the community aware of this issue without creating further human rights violations/problems.

5.  Brainstorm solutions and ideas that could improve the human rights violation and how these could be carried out.

Have each student write a report on the activity carried out in class.  Make sure that they can adequately explain why each step was taken, because this helps indicate their level of understanding.

What will happen to "x" if we do "y"?

To learn how to generate an action plan for an existing human rights issue.

Variable

1.  In small groups, research several existing human rights issues.
2.  Select a human rights issue requiring attention (overlap between groups is permissible as long as there are at least four different issues in the class).
3.  Brainstorm possible action plans to combat this human rights issue.
4.  Brainstorm possible consequences/results of implementing the chosen action plan.
5.  Have the class come together, as a whole, and examine each group's issue and proposed action plan.
6.  Encourage students to build on each other's action plans by coming up with further adaptations/ideas to better address the human rights issue (record these on a large piece of paper that can be posted in the classroom and or throughout the school for others to see).

Have students compare what they believed would happen if they implemented their action plan with what actually resulted when the action plan was implemented.  Also, have them discuss why there may be discrepancies between what they predicted and what resulted.

How can we work, in our community, to promote and protect human rights?

Linking the local environment and the global environment into a cohesive whole. For educational institutions, it might become a service-learning project. Such a project would exemplify an institutional commitment to the achievement of human rights. Furthermore it would make a statement to students and community about the importance of integrating theory and practice.

Variable

1. Begin by having participants identify local or global problems that concern them (e.g., homelessness, hunger, child abuse, land mines, violence against women). List these and then try to define the issues in terms of specific human rights (e.g., homelessness and hunger involve UDHR Article 25, which guarantees the right to an adequate standard of living). Note: This activity might be an extension of previous study or a totally new activity.

2. Have the group select 3 or 4 of these human rights issues to focus on. Divide participants into teams to research an issue.

3. Have each team draw on the research questions presented below in addition to generating their own:

      a) What is the problem as you see it? Try to define it in your own words.

      b) How does the problem manifest itself locally? Nationally? Globally?

      c) What specific rights are involved? Identify the relevant articles of the US Bill of Rights and the UDHR.

      d) Where does responsibility lie for the perpetration and perpetuation of this violation?

      e) Who benefits directly or indirectly as a result of this violation?

      f) Who suffers as directly or indirectly as a result of this violation?

      g) Are other individuals or groups working on this issue?

      h) What is being done locally, nationally, and globally to address this issue?

      i) Where does responsibility lie for addressing this issue?

      j) What might participants do to help in their community or in a larger context? 

4. Each team will then research its human rights issue. Some team members will survey the community to determine the extent of the problem locally and what governmental and nongovernmental organizations are doing to address it; others will gather the same sorts of data on the global conditions using a variety of resources, including libraries and the World Wide Web.

5. After discussing their findings, participants decide which human rights problem(s) they wish to adopt as an action project. The whole group might work on one issue or small groups may develop their separate projects.

6. During the remainder of the school year or project period, participants develop and implement an action plan that addresses the human rights problem through activities such as educating school and community via posters, plays, assemblies, public access television, newspaper articles, demonstrations, letter-writing campaigns. Fund raising, offering volunteer services, and lobbying government officials and elected representatives are also effective strategies. 

Have each participant, either individually or in a group, select a community human rights issue and formulate a plan to alleviate/solve this issue.  Afterwards, have the class, as a whole, rate each of the action plans according to set criteria, such as viability.

What do community members think of your action plan?  Additionally, in their experience, do they believe it would work?  Do they have any suggestions?

Aid in the exchange of ideas between the students and the greater community so the two parties can learn from each other by having the students present their action plan for improving the hypothetical "x" situation created in Activity C.  

Variable

1.  Designate a time for a student-community forum to discuss the "x" situation and to examine the students' response to it.

2.  Have the community meet as a group, without the students, before the forum to discuss and create their own action plan for "x".

3.  Have the two groups meet together in the forum scenario to exchange ideas and learn from one another.

Have the community members, if willing, to fill out “Comment Cards” on the action plans of the student groups.  Include, on the cards, such topics as the plan’s viability and other real-life obstacles the plan could would need to overcome.  Then, take the “Comment Cards” and have the respective groups respond to them by either defending their plan as it exists or by having them alter their plan to cope with the obstacles.

How can we evaluate whether or not our action plan, when dealing with trying to resolve a human rights violation, was a success?

Help students develop a checklist of sorts to examine action plans and then compute whether or not the plan was a success in improving a situation/problem.

Variable

1.  Have the class choose a human rights violation.

2.  Have the class create an action plan to improve or solve that human rights violation.

3.  Discuss, hypothetically, what could go wrong in the implementation of the action plan.  Discuss ramifications of these possible consequences.

4.  Using the knowledge gained from the previous three steps, have the class create a checklist of items to check to see if the situation after the action plan was better than before the action plan.  Such items could include the welfare of all parties involved (both those whose rights were violated and those who had done the violating).

Have the students use the checklist formed in class to evaluate the effectiveness of another action plan that was implemented elsewhere (this could be found by examining human rights stories in the media).

How can we communicate what we have learned to the larger community?

Have students, either individually or as pairs, choose a human rights topic and present this at a community-wide fair.

Variable

1.  Divide students into small groups.

2.  Have students, within their small groups, brainstorm human rights topics.

3.  Allow students to select the topic they feel would be the most beneficial for the community (make sure choice is appropriate for demographics).

4.  Provide students with class time for topic research and for work on their presentations.

5.  Have students present their pieces at a community-wide fair/exhibition.

Evaluate students based on their presentations of their chosen topics, i.e. depth of material covered, creativity, etc.