World Social Forum Dakar - Call for volunteers

The World Social Forum will take place in Dakar, Senegal, West Africa from Feburary 6 to 11, 2010. The WSF Organizers have asked Babels to manage interpretation during this forum. Several other fora (Migrants Forum, Inhabitantants Forum, Health Forum, Science & Democracy Forum...), will be held in the week prior to the Forum. We will be pooling our combined means with some of them, so will need some people from February 1st.

A strong team of local African language volunteers is presently being recruited and will be trained in Dakar. We will also need a number of EXPERIENCED and PROFESSIONAL interpreters from outside Senegal for other languages. The list of required languages will be compiled from the list of speakers and the requests of the participant delegations, but will mainly be French, English, Portuguese, Spanish and Arabic.

Due to budgetary constraints, we can only select volunteers from Africa and Europe. Tickets from the Americas or Asia are unfortunately too expensive.

In accordance with BABELS rules, we will ensure there is a balance of experienced and first-time interpreters in the booths. The selection process will also be TRANSPARENT and INCLUSIVE. We will document every step of the selection process and report on it publicly, via the Babels forum and mailing list.

IF YOU WANT TO HELP WITH SELECTION please let us know (see below).

AVAILABILITY : we will be organizing training sessions for community interpreters prior to the Forum. If you can come earlier to help with this training, with the additional fora or general logistic tasks please tell us.

The WSF-OC will pay for your ticket and accomodation. There will be a per diem of 15000 cfa/day (22€) to cover your food and transport (which will cost less than that). Accommodation will probably be in shared flats. More information on logistics will be provided later on.

YOU NEED TO HAVE A VALID PASSPORT (six month remaining validity) AS WELL AS YELLOW FEVER VACCINATION. Visa requirement depends on your nationality, check with the Senegalese Embassy in your country.

IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN PARTICIPATING - please go to the following URL:and fill out the form. We will contact you shortly to confirm your registration.

http://goo.gl/KV1me

IF YOU ARE SELECTED WE WILL INFORM YOU AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE.

In solidarity

The Babels coordination team for 2011 WSF.