Olena Skaletska author's project

"Why I am Ukrainian"

Project
A documentary by Olena Skaletska, which explores the topic of national identity formation. This is a woman's story of a mother, a grandmother, who wants to tell her young Ukrainian granddaughter, born in Holland, the way to realizing her personal national identity.
Task
To encourage Ukrainians who live in their homeland or abroad to understand their national identity. Is it important to understand your national identity? Where Ukrainians living outside of Ukraine can find theirs. How is knowledge about your lineage, your roots, family traditions transmitted and what exactly is this knowledge.
Project outcomes

To interest people in studying the history and literature of Ukraine.

Involve children in reading Ukrainian fairy tales, stories, watching Ukrainian animation and feature films, or films in the Ukrainian language.

Strengthening the interest in the Ukrainian language and the desire to speak it among Russian-speaking Ukrainians.

Porject participants
Ukrainian women of different ages and professions who live in different cities of Ukraine, Europe, and Canada
Team
What exactly is planned?
Documentary film in the format of journalistic research on the topic of formation of national identity based on personal experience and with the help of the heroes of the film.

The heroines of the film are Ukrainian women of various ages and professions, who live in Ukraine, European countries, and Canada, share their personal stories about how they feel that they are Ukrainian. When they realized it, how exactly, who helped along the way. Did the war change the sense of belonging to one's nation and how exactly. What or who helps to strengthen one's identity in a foreign country. What gives a person a sense of his national identity and how this knowledge is transmitted to descendants. Are there magical messages from a mother to her child that help them understand their identity.

Who is the author of the project?

Olena Skaletska is a journalist who worked for a long time as a director of the Kharkiv independent television broadcasting company SIMON. Author, screenwriter, director of television projects on the subject of cinema, music, sports, and health.

Now he lives in Canada and continues to work in journalism at the Ukrainian radio Ridne Radio Ottawa.

Olena relies on her personal experience of realizing her identity as a Ukrainian, as well as on the experience of the film's characters.

Who are the project participants?

The heroins of the film help the journalist to investigate the topic.
She is a Ukrainian actress, theater director who moved to Canada because of the war and works in a Ukrainian theater in Toronto.

This is a family of Ukrainians who were born in Poland, but were able to strengthen and develop their national identity in Canada, which gave them more freedom in self-awareness.

She is a TV presenter from Kharkiv who moved to Poland because of the war, and her daughter serves in the ranks of the Ukrainian army.

She is a teacher from Kryvyi Rih who buried her only son, who volunteered to defend his homeland.

These are Ukrainian women of different ages and professions who live in different cities of Ukraine.

How did they realize their nationality?
How will it change and what affects these transformations?
How do parents pass this knowledge on to their children?
Do these magical messages of mothers to their sons and daughters exist, what is it like to be Ukrainian?