Experiences from the experienced- The Human Library Bangalore

Each book has a tale, and each person is a book. Discover living ‘books’ at Bangalore!

Each one of us on this planet has a story to tell. Imagine how amazing would it be if we could actually ‘read’ people, know their tales, and learn from their experiences. Well this might actually be a reality for you folks living in Bangalore!

A non–profit organization started in Denmark, the “Human Library” has been set up to fight social stigmas and stereotypes through conversations between people from all fields of life. This is based on the theory that rather than borrowing physical books, one can borrow human beings as books and learn from the plethora of emotions and knowledge they have to offer, aiming to narrow the gap between people by means of dialogue. You can choose ‘Books’ (people) to read from not by their names, but by their experiences. There are books like ‘Refugee’, ‘Homeless’, ‘Molested’, ‘Cancer survivor’, ‘Specially- abled’ etc. The talk ends when the book or the reader wishes. 

The good news is that this organization has now landed in Bangalore, and is looking out for books (well, people) wanting to be read. The first session of the library already took place on the 28th of August, in Indiranagar. This kicked off with 8 books and over 250 registered readers. This event had 60 people who applied to be books out of which 8 were shortlisted. Each book was assigned not more than 5 readers, and was given a span of twenty minutes after which the book had to be returned to the library to be issued to another. 

Forums like these not only help people develop empathy and non-judgementality but also help unlearn a lot of stereotypes that they have been conditioned to. And for people who said they’d rather listen to a book than read one, this one’s for you!

If you would like to be a book for the next session of the library, apply here!