The World Scout Jamboree is a
Scouting
Scouting, also known as the Scout Movement, is a worldwide youth movement employing the Scout method, a program of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activities, including camping, woodcraft, aquatics, hiking, backpacking ...
jamboree of the
World Organization of the Scout Movement
The World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM ) is the largest international Scouting organization. WOSM has 173 members. These members are recognized national Scout organizations, which collectively have around 43 million participants. WOS ...
, typically attended by several tens of thousands of Scouts from around the world, aged 14 to 17.
The first World Scout Jamboree was organized by
The Boy Scout Association in London. With exceptions for the World War years and the Iranian Revolution, it has been organized approximately every four years, and in the more recent years has been organised by the
World Organization of the Scout Movement
The World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM ) is the largest international Scouting organization. WOSM has 173 members. These members are recognized national Scout organizations, which collectively have around 43 million participants. WOS ...
(WOSM), in different locations over the world. At the jamboree, many scouts will swap badges.
In
lexicography
Lexicography is the study of lexicons, and is divided into two separate academic disciplines. It is the art of compiling dictionaries.
* Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries.
* Theoretica ...
, "Jamboree" is considered an
Americanism that traces back to 1860–65 and refers to a joyful, noisy gathering. The term is believed to originate from the words jabber (rapid, indistinct talk) and
shivaree (noisy celebration), with "m" from jam (crowd).
History
While World Scout Jamboree is the expression used by the
World Organization of the Scout Movement
The World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM ) is the largest international Scouting organization. WOSM has 173 members. These members are recognized national Scout organizations, which collectively have around 43 million participants. WOS ...
,
other organizations held events called "jamborees" for their members.
The
Scouting
Scouting, also known as the Scout Movement, is a worldwide youth movement employing the Scout method, a program of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activities, including camping, woodcraft, aquatics, hiking, backpacking ...
program became an international success following its founding by
Robert Baden-Powell
Lieutenant-General Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell, ( ; (Commonly pronounced by others as ) 22 February 1857 – 8 January 1941) was a British Army officer, writer, founder and first Chief Scout of the worl ...
in 1907. With its continuing growth, the founder of the movement saw a need for a gathering of representatives of Scouting from all around the world. The general aim was to foster a worldwide brotherhood, and to help the young Scouts in the movement learn about other peoples and nations by direct interaction with them.
The idea of organizing such periodical international gatherings was originally conveyed to Baden-Powell by the General Chief of the
Scouts of Greece, Konstantinos ("Kokos") Melas, during the 1918 international Scout meeting, in England. Captain Melas proposed the gatherings should repeat every four years, in the same way
Olympic Games
The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a var ...
were held in
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece ( el, Ἑλλάς, Hellás) was a northeastern Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of classical antiquity ( AD 600), that comprised a loose collection of cult ...
. The suggestion was accepted with enthusiasm by Baden-Powell, who named the gatherings "Jamborees".
It was in 1920 that the first World Scout Jamboree was realized, held in
the Olympia halls in
Kensington
Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the West End of London, West of Central London.
The district's commercial heart is Kensington High Street, running on an east–west axis. The north-east is taken up b ...
, London. Symbolically, the Jamboree site bore the name of the birthplace of the
Olympic Games
The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a var ...
,
Olympia
The name Olympia may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Film
* ''Olympia'' (1938 film), by Leni Riefenstahl, documenting the Berlin-hosted Olympic Games
* ''Olympia'' (1998 film), about a Mexican soap opera star who pursues a career as an athlet ...
. 8,000 Scouts from 34 countries attended the event.
Thereafter, a Jamboree has been held every four years. There are two exceptions to this: no Jamboree was held between 1937 and 1947 because of the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, and the 1979 Jamboree, which was to be held in
Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
, was cancelled due to the
political upheaval in the region at that time. The Jamboree has been held in different countries around the world. The first seven Jamborees were held in Europe. The eighth World Jamboree was held in North America where the tradition of moving the Jamboree among the continents began. As yet, Africa has not hosted a jamboree.
To replace the cancelled event of 1979, the
World Scout Committee
The World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM ) is the largest international Scouting organization. WOSM has 173 members. These members are recognized national Scout organizations, which collectively have around 43 million participants. WOSM ...
determined that an alternative celebration, the
World Jamboree Year should take place. Several regional camps took place, such as the 12th Australian/4th Asia-Pacific Jamboree, held in Perth, Western Australia, along with countless Join-in-Jamboree activities — designed to allow Scouts from around the world to participate in an activity that thousands of other Scouts around the world were also participating in at the same time. This ''Join-in'' programme was reproduced again as part of the
Scouting 2007 Centenary
The Scouting 2007 Centenary comprised celebrations around the world in which Scouts celebrated 100 years of the world Scout movement. The original celebrations were focused on the United Kingdom, such as the camp on Brownsea Island, the birthpla ...
celebrations.
The greatest attendance of all Jamborees was in 2019, where over 45,000 members experienced a Jamboree in West Virginia, USA. This number represented the permanent contingent who remained for the entire event. They were joined by hundreds of thousands of visiting Scouts who participated on a day basis.
The first Jamboree was more akin to an exhibition of Scouting, allowing visitors to see how things were done in other parts of the world. The Second Jamboree was conducted on a camp basis and each successive Jamboree has developed on this format where the programme is typically more activity oriented, with plenty of time for Scouts from different nations to interact and learn about each other in less formal ways than an exhibition would allow.
The
16th World Scout Jamboree went to the
Southern Hemisphere for the first time, in
Sydney
Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...
,
NSW
)
, nickname =
, image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, es ...
,
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
.
The
21st World Scout Jamboree in 2007 was held in
Hylands Park
Hylands House is a Grade II* neo-classical villa situated within Hylands Park a 232-hectare (574 acre) park southwest of Chelmsford in Essex in South East England. It is owned and operated by Chelmsford City Council.
History
The last private ...
,
Essex
Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...
, United Kingdom, and celebrated the
Centenary of Scouting. Because of this, the honour of hosting the event was again bestowed upon the United Kingdom, as the birthplace of Scouting. Over 40,000 young people camped in August at
Hylands Park
Hylands House is a Grade II* neo-classical villa situated within Hylands Park a 232-hectare (574 acre) park southwest of Chelmsford in Essex in South East England. It is owned and operated by Chelmsford City Council.
History
The last private ...
in
Chelmsford
Chelmsford () is a city in the City of Chelmsford district in the county of Essex, England. It is the county town of Essex and one of three cities in the county, along with Southend-on-Sea and Colchester. It is located north-east of London a ...
,
Essex
Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...
. Hundreds of thousands of day visitors attended events in the south-east of England as part of the Jamboree.
The
22nd World Scout Jamboree
The 22nd World Scout Jamboree (Swedish: ''22:a världsjamboreen'') took place in Rinkaby, Kristianstad, Scania in southern Sweden from 27 July to 7 August 2011. The theme was ''Simply Scouting''. 40,061 Scouts, leaders and adult volunteers parti ...
was at
Rinkaby
Rinkaby is a locality situated in Kristianstad Municipality, Skåne County, Sweden with 745 inhabitants in 2010. It is close to Lake Hammarsjön and 12 kilometres from Kristianstad. The village has a pre-school and primary school which is housed ...
, Sweden from 27 July to 8 August 2011; the
23rd World Scout Jamboree was at
Kirara-hama,
Yamaguchi City, Japan from 28 July to 8 August 2015; the
24th World Scout Jamboree
The 24th World Scout Jamboree (Spanish: ''24º Jamboree Scout Mundial'', French: ''24e Jamboree Scout Mondial'') was held at the Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve in West Virginia from 22 July to 2 August 2019. The hosting duties wer ...
was at
The Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve
The Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve, often shortened as Summit Bechtel Reserve (SBR), located in Fayette and Raleigh counties, near Beckley, West Virginia, is one of four facilities managed by the National Council of the Boy Scou ...
in West Virginia, United States, from 22 July to 2 August 2019. The next
World Scout Jamboree
The World Scout Jamboree is a Scouting jamboree of the World Organization of the Scout Movement, typically attended by several tens of thousands of Scouts from around the world, aged 14 to 17.
The first World Scout Jamboree was organized by Th ...
will be held at
Saemangeum
Saemangeum is an estuary, estuarine tidal flat on the coast of the Yellow Sea in South Korea. It was dammed by the government of South Korea's Saemangeum Seawall, Saemangeum Seawall Project, completed on April 27, 2010, after a long fight betw ...
, South Korea from 2 to 12 August 2023.
Related world-wide events
Jamboree on the Air
Jamboree on the Air, usually referred to as JOTA, is an international
Scouting
Scouting, also known as the Scout Movement, is a worldwide youth movement employing the Scout method, a program of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activities, including camping, woodcraft, aquatics, hiking, backpacking ...
and
Guiding activity held annually on the third full weekend in October. The event was first held in conjunction with the fiftieth anniversary of Scouting in 1957, and was devised by radio amateur operator
Leslie R. Mitchell
Leslie R. "Les" Mitchell ( Hammersmith, England 9 December 1923 – 6 October 2014 Bingley, West Yorkshire, England), a Scouter and a radio amateur with the callsign G3BHK, was the founder of Jamboree-on-the-Air (JOTA), now considered the larges ...
who used the callsign G3BHK. It is now considered the largest event organized by the WOSM annually.
Amateur radio operator
An amateur radio operator is someone who uses equipment at an amateur radio station to engage in two-way personal communications with other amateur operators on radio frequencies assigned to the amateur radio service. Amateur radio operators hav ...
s from all over the world participate with over 500,000 Scouts and Guides to teach them about radio and to assist them to contact their fellow Scouts and Guides by means of
amateur radio
Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emergency communic ...
and since 2004, by the
VOIP
Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Internet t ...
-based
Echolink
EchoLink is a computer-based Amateur Radio system distributed free of charge that allows radio amateurs to communicate with other amateur radio operators using Voice over IP (VoIP) technology on the Internet for at least part of the path between t ...
. Scouts and Guides are also encouraged to send paper or electronic confirmations known as "
QSL cards", or "eQSLs" when they are sent electronically. This provides the Scouts and Guides with a means of learning about fellow Scouts and Guides from around the world. It is an adjunct to the World Scout Jamboree.
The event is recognized as one of international participation by the various Scout and Guide organisations, and supports several awards which are a part of Scouting and Guiding programmes.
Jamboree on the Internet
Jamboree on the Internet, known by its acronym JOTI, is an international
Scouting
Scouting, also known as the Scout Movement, is a worldwide youth movement employing the Scout method, a program of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activities, including camping, woodcraft, aquatics, hiking, backpacking ...
activity held annually. Participants, through the use of designated Chats from all over the world, can contact their fellow Scouts by means of the
Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
. Common communication methods include ScoutLink (IRC), e-mail, and VOIP. This provides the Scouts with a means of learning about fellow Scouts from around the world. JOTI operates alongside JOTA (Jamboree on the Air) and is an official event of the World Organization of the Scout Movement.
JOTI was pioneered in 1995 by Queanbeyan Rovers whilst one Rover, Norvan Vogt was on a student exchange in the Netherlands, with the home crew in Australia co-ordinated by Brett Sheffield. They connected
Putten
Putten () is a municipality and town in the province of Gelderland, Netherlands. It had a population of
in . It is located in the coastal area of the old Zuiderzee (Southern Sea). To the east of Putten lies the Veluwe, the biggest national par ...
, Netherlands and
Queanbeyan
Queanbeyan ( ) is a city in the south-eastern region of New South Wales, Australia, located adjacent to the Australian Capital Territory in the Southern Tablelands region. Located on the Queanbeyan River, the city is the council seat of the ...
, Australia with dedicated
IRC
Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a text-based chat system for instant messaging. IRC is designed for group communication in discussion forums, called '' channels'', but also allows one-on-one communication via private messages as well as chat an ...
servers. In November 1996 the
World Scout Committee
The World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM ) is the largest international Scouting organization. WOSM has 173 members. These members are recognized national Scout organizations, which collectively have around 43 million participants. WOSM ...
, noting that Scouting already had a considerable presence on the Internet, and that there was already an informal and rapidly growing Jamboree on the Internet, decided that JOTI should become an official international Scouting event, and that it should be held on the same weekend as the Jamboree on the Air (JOTA).
2011 saw the first ever
JOTI Radio station, a broadcast internet radio station based in the UK to provide entertainment for the JOTI weekend, which had live interviews from Scouts all over the world, the team that lead JOTI Radio are made up of the
Avon Scout Radio team, which are a County Active Support Unit for Avon Scouts and provide broadcast radio services within the Scouting Movement worldwide.. JOTI Radio is now part of the annual JOTA/JOTI weekend.
Jamboree on the Trail
Following on the idea of the ''Join-in'' events from the World Jamboree Year, Jamboree on the Trail (or JOTT),
is a co-ordinated event where Scouts around the world simultaneously participate in local hikes. It takes place on an annual basis on the 2nd Saturday in May.
This type of event allows Scouts to take part in activities at the same time as other Scouts, promoting the idea of the Scouting brotherhood. Participants are awarded a JOTT badge as a recognition of having participated in this worldwide event.
Smaller events
There are up to ten smaller Jamboree (or Jamborette) events held each year around the world. This includes
Regional
In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and t ...
Jamborees, which are held every three years in their areas of the world. Scouts from outside these regions are invited, but attendance is generally lower (for example, the
EuroJam 2005
The European Scout Jamboree (or EuroJam) is an international Scouting jamboree, which is organized at irregular times by the European Scout Region of the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM).
So far, two European Scout Jamborees h ...
event hosted 10,000 Scouts, mostly from Europe).
National associations, and sub-national groups, also organise a number of events, such as the
WINGS
A wing is a type of fin that produces lift while moving through air or some other fluid. Accordingly, wings have streamlined cross-sections that are subject to aerodynamic forces and act as airfoils. A wing's aerodynamic efficiency is expresse ...
event and
KIJ, which is organised by a
County
A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesChambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...
level body.
List of events
See also
*
World Scout Moot
The World Scout Moot is an event for senior branches of Scouting (traditionally called Rover Scout, Rovers) and other young adult Scouts, gathering up to 5,000 people. Moots provide an opportunity for young adults in Scouting to meet, with the o ...
*
World Scout Indaba
The World Scout Indaba was a gathering of Scout Leaders from around the world. Created at the 1949 12th World Scout Conference in Elvesæter, Norway where The Boy Scouts Association of the United Kingdom submitted that of the great number of Scou ...
*
World Camp (Guiding)
There have been several World Camps held by the Girl Guide, Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, first held in 1924. Organized by the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, unlike World Scout Jamborees, World Camps are not named with an Ordinal ...
Notes
References
External links
;World Scout Jamboree
What we do - World Scout JamboreeHistory of the World Scout Jamboree8th World Scout Jamboree 195511th World Scout Jamboree 196323rd World Scout Jamboree 201524th World Scout Jamboree 2019Svojsik's Dream- 4th World Scout Jamboree bid by Czechoslovakia
;Jamboree on the Air and Jamboree on the Internet
Jamboree on the Air and Jamboree on the InternetScoutLink's Website;Jamboree on the Trail
JOTT's main siteJOTT's UK site
{{Scouting
Scouting jamborees
Recurring events established in 1920
Quadrennial events