The Tampon Taboo

Sign in Indonesia, Source: Flikr Creative Commons

For girls everywhere menstruation is a rite of passage. Menstruation is a healthy, normal bodily function that affects half of our population -- the overwhelming majority of our women, at some point in time. But for too many girls worldwide this shared experience is a source of shame, restriction and if badly managed -- illness. Menstruation is an age-old phenomenon and across the developed world we’ve built awareness, products and systems to manage menstrual hygiene to enable women to live their lives seamlessly. Even with such support we can still argue that menstruation is something we’d rather not talk about in the developed world  -- but in the developing world, the stigma around menstruation has led to an invisibility around it that can really hold our girls and women back.

According to the Geneva-based Water Supply & Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC), even sectors such as water and sanitation which “routinely deal with unmentionables such as excreta, ignore girl’s and women’s need for safe spaces to manage menstrual hygiene and mechanisms for safe disposal of materials used to absorb menstrual blood.” As we all know, ignoring a problem -- or menstruation -- does not make it go away. NGO Plan International and A C Nielsen conducted a study and estimated that there are 355 million menstruating women in India -- but only 12% of them use sanitary napkins. The study even found that 23% of Indian girls drop out of school after reaching puberty, with irreversible effects on their health, well-being and participation in society. Millions of girls and women instead rely on old rags, dried leaves and grass, ash, sand or newspaper to manage their monthly menstrual flows -- shrouded by shame and disgust on a vital bodily function.

Columbia University,  Millennium Promise and the social enterprise, Be Girl also hosted pilots for menstrual hygiene products and one of their participants, Patience, a 15-year-old girl from Ruhiira, Uganda told them “you suffer a lot; in case you stamp [stain] the boys can make fun of you which causes you to lose your self-esteem […] it’s embarrassing when you are washing your soiled clothes. It makes you not even want to go to school.” The washing of stained rags or clothing can also bring shame, especially in areas of water scarcity. Be Girl reports that in rural Africa, 40% of school girls miss up to 5 school days a month, or 30% of the school year. WaterAid found that 82% of their surveyed girls in Malawi did now know about menstruation before it started; girls across their surveyed countries were found to be excluded from water sources during menstruation, and even prohibited from washing and bathing in some communities making what is often a difficult week even more difficult to bear.

Source: WaterAid

Given the success of feminine hygiene and menstruation products, and the important role it has played in women's empowerment history, it would appear that the private sector could have significant market opportunity if they can break this taboo for women and girls -- who are expected to require the products for more tham 50 years. Sanitary products must be designed to be affordable; disposable tampons and sanitary towels are often priced out of reach of low- and even middle-income families if supply is scarce. Euromonitor International found that women in India, with average earnings of US $750 per annum earns below the $1,000 per annum deemed necessary to easily purchase disposable menstruation products. Moreover, systems to support menstrual hygiene are necessary, products alone aren’t the solution: appropriately designed and managed community spaces and importantly education on female reproductive health.

To make this happen, WSSCC believes that breaking the silence around the taboo of menstruation is a crucial first step. Girls should be informed and encouraged to talk and discuss menstruation in an informed and positive manner to prepare them emotionally and physically for the onset of menstruation and their monthly menstrual periods. Families need the education to support their girls and women. WaterAid has also compiled a phenomenal guide, Menstrual Hygiene Matters, with nine modules and tool kits -- an essential resource -- to improve menstrual hygienic for women and girls in lower and middle-income countries.

WaterAid found that well designed and appropriate water, sanitation and hygiene facilities that address menstrual hygiene can make a significant difference to the schooling experience of adolescent girls
(Photo: WaterAid/ASM Shafiqur Rahman) 

As WSSCC spokesperson, Archana Patkar,  powerfully argues: “Women are the progenitors of the human race […] Menstruation is therefore something of which they can and should be proud, so each and every one of us should work to improve the lives and life chances for women who do not have access to clean materials, water and safe disposal facilities; who cannot talk about their experiences; or are never asked if they can help define a solution.”

What I Talk About When I Talk About Money

Source: Flickr Creative Commons

“Money is never just about money” argues a leading financial services designer, James Moed, over a dinner attended by financial inclusion professionals hosted by Women Advancing Microfinance UK. "Instead," he explains, "it’s pretty much always about something else." In conversation with James, who has over 11 years of experience in helping innovation leaders and design teams understand people’s complex behaviours around money, we learnt how we can use Human Centered Design (HCD) to promote global financial inclusion -- an issue particularly pertinent to the world’s women.  According to the UNDP, 6 out of 10 of the world’s poorest people are women; women may comprise more than 50% of the world’s population but only own 1% of the world’s wealth. Some 75% of the world’s women are without access to bank loans as they have unpaid or insecure jobs and are not entitled to property ownership.

This blog will share some of the insights from James’ experiences having advised companies, governments, startups, and social enterprises, most recently as the Director for Financial Service Design at the London office of IDEO, a global innovation consultancy.

First, what is human-centered design (HCD)?

HCD applies the design process to create innovative solutions based on observations on humans. The HCD process begins by examining the needs, dreams and behaviours of people relevant to a prospective solution. A solution can be a product, a service, an environment, an organization or a mode of interaction. HCD focuses on desirability (what do people desire?), feasibility (what is technically and organizationally feasible?) and viability (what is financially possible?). It is an iterative process -- borrowing from the designer who observes, prototypes, tests and then repeats until an appropriate solution is reached. James describes the approach as "building to learn," creating imperfect examples of solutions to be tested by user experience instead of aiming to launch the perfectly formed solution straightaway.

Original Invitation for the HCD event with WAM UK

How can HCD help promote women in financial inclusion?

HCD depends on human observation and often women and girls have been ignored in the design of financial products and services. Even if they haven’t been explicitly ignored, then perhaps not enough nuance to their culture could have supported their financial exclusion. Such as failing to pay attention to what women and girls feel like they can and cannot say in interviews and surveys. Moreover, there is a big difference between what people say they will do, and what they actually do -- especially when it comes to money. HCD promotes user insight, so adopting an approach to always consider gender in the target user group is vital and can be extremely telling. Designing solutions with women’s behaviours, aspirations and needs specifically in mind can lead to women-inclusive financial solutions.

What kind of HCD insights on women do we have?

Investing in women has a multiplier effect

One of the major observations in microfinance -- the provision of financial service to the under and unbanked -- is based on gender. Women’s World Banking found that, "when a woman generates her own income -- and this holds true no matter what the  country -- she re-invests her profits in ways that  can make long-term, inter-generational change: the  education of her children, health care for her family and improving the quality of her family’s housing”. As James highlighted in our conversation, time and time again in his fieldwork, he saw that for women "finances are less about her own interests, but for others." Financial inclusion for women does not only empower the woman user, but often has positive impact on her wider community.

Source: Flickr Creative Commons

For some women illiquidity is attractive

Mind boggling at first, especially when we consider the gender discrimination that has led to three quarters of the world’s women unbanked, women may actually prefer access to financial services with features of illiquidity in some circumstances. Liquid cash could be dangerous to a woman’s wealth if socially she is obligated to financially help out family members and friends if they ask. It may be hard for a woman to not hand over her cash to her husband for example or her friend in financial difficulty -- it could bring stigma, perhaps attack if she says no. However a savings account with fixed non-withdrawal periods, or other features to lock funds away, could provide a socially acceptable excuse. In providing illiquidity in formal financial services, it could attract women who otherwise would prefer to store their wealth in more illiquid forms such as gold and livestock or hidden away in difficult to reach places. Illiquidity could not only protect wealth from the saver’s own impulses, and the demands of those around her.

Women experience high emotional return for good financial management

A recurring theme in James’ work saw that the rewards for good financial management were beyond financial for women -- this applies to women across the economic spectrum. Juntos Finazas, which was borne out of a class project from the Stanford Design School, helps Spanish speakers save via SMS. The founders saw that SMS was the right technology to help low-income Latinos as they tend to use mobile devices more than other groups and are substantial SMS users. Around 72% of successful Juntos Finazas savers said at sign up that they had never saved successfully before. Importantly, in feedback, users cite that using the tool to help them save has made them feel like better mothers, better daughters -- the return is more than extra money leftover in an account.

In consultation with IDEO, the successful Keep the Change savings program from Bank of America originated from the observation that women were more satisfied by the act of saving than the interest rates offered on savings itself. The program was therefore designed to emphasize the action of saving rather than focusing on the potential reward. Keep the Change automatically rounds up purchases on the Bank of America debit card and transfers the difference to a savings account, building up a savings balance subtly over time. Since its launch in 2005, the program has led to 12 million new customers building up an additional $3.1 billion of savings.

Financial planning can save lives

Having a financial plan in place affords protection for life’s shocks, and in some cases can make the difference between life and death. Although still imperfect, there are now maternity saving programs to help women save money over time to access skilled maternal care. In Kenya, where only 43% of births occur in health facilities and many Kenyans still lack access to basic maternity care and health insurance, medical payment can be a life-threatening barrier for mother and child. Changamka, established in 2008, developed a smartcard program which allows women to set saving goals and save via the mobile payments service, M-PESA. The program is a dedicated maternal savings program which locks the deposited funds for maternity expenses only. USAID has written up a case study on this project, which can be accessed here.

With financial technology advancing globally the practice of HCD, people are placed back in the center of experience to build lasting solutions. With 75% of women worldwide without access to financial services -- and importantly, the lack of understanding and emphasis upon their needs as cause and effect of their exclusion -- HCD can provide an attractive framework to unlock their considerable potential.

For more information on the topic connect with @jamesmoed, @WAM_UK, and @lisavwong on Twitter. Other interesting links on HCD and financial inclusion include:

• A CGAP video on bringing savings products to market
• The HCD toolkit by IDEO
• Free online course on HCD by +Acumen and IDEO.

I Embrace My Female Nerd (and So Can You)

There's something I want to go ahead and put out there: I am a nerd. Many of my female role models live in alternate universes, fight aliens in space, are spies or witches, and are, well, fictional. As this is my first official post as a contributor to Her Blueprint, I feel it is important to get that admission out of the way.

There's been a lot of social commentary written about calling oneself a nerd (or a geek) as nerd-culture has become increasingly popular with rise of Comic-Con International, shows like The Big Bang Theory and Game of Thrones, and Marvel Studio's super-secret plan for world domina... I mean, modestly successful franchises—it's become popular to be a nerd, and self-proclaimed "real nerds" don't like that people are jumping on their Battlestar Galactica or throwing on a Browncoat at this stage in the game.

Any discussion about who gets to call themselves a "real nerd" belongs on another blog (or better yet, on no blogs, as personally, I think it's a ridiculous conversation to have in the first place) — I bring it up as something of an introduction to myself (because I'll bring nerd things into a conversation whenever possible) and as a segue into the actual point of this post: the rising popularity of women in sci-fi.

It’s a broad topic, I know, as well-written female protagonists are hard to come by in any genre, and despite valiant attempts by comic book and fiction writers, female characters rarely translate into box-office dollars and second season pick-ups—until recently, that is. More and more, we're seeing films like Maleficent and Lucy, starring Angelina Jolie and Scarlet Johansson, respectively, put into production; both films are currently in the top 25 grossing films of 2014, with Jolie's Maleficent sitting in the #2 spot, with $747.6 million earned so far, 68% of which is from overseas markets.

Science fiction, and its sister genre fantasy, has always been the refuge of counter-culture; time travel, space exploration, dystopian futures wrought at the hands of despots and the revolutionaries that overthrow them—science fiction is where we look for change and hope. As the boom of nerd-culture sweeps Hollywood, the reach of the sci-fi genre is increasing as well. So far in 2014, seven of the top grossing films in South Africa are sci-fi, already tying 2013's numbers. In Argentina, eight of the top 20 grossing films are from the genre, up from six in 2013. Similar increases can be seen in Peru and Lebanon, with 11 and nine films so far in 2014, compared to nine and six in 2013, respectively.

And there's no lack of science fiction productions on the horizon, with films like The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies, Cinderella, and Marvel's Avengers: Age of Ultron, all coming out in the next year. And each of these films features at least one lead female character.

In 2013, the top ten grossing films earned an average of 64% of their total revenues from overseas markets; as Hollywood's sci-fi moves toward more equal gender representation, that representation can be seen reaching into international markets as well.

The landscape of television is seeing similar movements, as was evident at this year's International Comic-Con in San Diego. From events with the casts of BBC's Orphan Black and HBO's Game of Thrones, and Entertainment Weekly's Women Who Kick Ass panel, women took the lead with more than ten panels solely dedicated to female representation across mediums. Women also ruled the convention floor with gender-bent cosplay and a nerd-themed fashion show.

Katey Sagal, Sarah Paulson, Tatiana Maslany, Nicole Beharie, Maisie Williams and Natalie Dormer speaking at the 2014 San Diego Comic Con International, for "Entertainment Weekly: Women Who Kick Ass", at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, California. Photo by Gage Skidmore.

There was a time in my life when I wanted to work for the CIA—I wanted to be like Sydney Bristow, Jennifer Garner's character in Alias, traveling around the world in disguises, stealing computer chips and taking out the bad guys. That's a lie, actually, I still want to be like Sydney Bristow, despite every one of my fiercely liberal bones telling me otherwise. Young women—all women—need positive role models, and the amazing thing about the human imagination is that the person inspiring you doesn't need to be real. For better or worse, the reach of popular culture cannot be denied; it is imperative that we continue to move toward and support more female lead characters. And science fiction is a great place to start.

Doctor Who-a threat to the political and social order? [The Guardian]
Women Totally Dominated This Year's Comic-Con International [Nerdist.com]
Yearly Box Office [BoxOfficeMojo]

My Cup of Tea: Narrating Collective and Individual Stories through Illustration

When you hear the word "illustration," what does it conjure for you? For four Indian women illustrators -- Kalyani Ganapathy, Bakula Nayak, Shreyas R Krishnan, and Trusha Sawant -- illustration produces a host of associations for each artist. The meshing of these individual visions has resulted in them forming a collective, which exhibited its first edition, My Cup of Tea last October at Kynkyny Art Gallery, Bangalore, India.

What was the story behind the formation of the collective? When Kalyani Ganapathy decided to become a full-time illustrator, she had the idea for an illustrator's collective; what she awaited was the right people and time for it to assume shape. Meanwhile, unknown to her, Kalyani's illustrations had motivated brand strategist and packaging designer Bakula Nayak to return to illustration after many years. Their first meeting over a cup of tea set the ball rolling for the collective. Kalyani then wrote to her  long-time friend Shreyas R Krishnan, also an illustrator, to ask her to the join the collective; Shreyas meanwhile had been collaborating on a sketch-book swap project with her colleague, Trusha Sawant. When the four finally met in person, they realized that between them they had varying styles and interests. However, what brought them together was their love for narrating through the drawn image. Over their discussions, the concept underlying the Illustrator's Collective grew into a space (literal and otherwise) for like-minded illustrators to come together and share common interests: it would also bring the practice of contemporary illustrations to a wider audience. 
 
Here is a glimpse into each of these illustrators' works and individual mindscapes. 

Kalyani Ganapathy

Sun kissed

"For me, illustration is a powerful medium of expression, both for self and others," says Kalyani, whose dreamy illustrations displayed in the exhibition consisted of the intriguingly titled, Memory Box, which she describes as a visual journey, a sensory experience from her recent travels. "I walk through life, observing everything in slow motion. I soak in everything around me and create a ‘curated’ memory box in my mind. I sit in my studio, open the box and allow the contents to spill out onto paper," she says. "Every time I put my brush on paper, it brought on so much nostalgia and emotion, reminding me of little moments in life."

Shreyas R Krishnan

Hidden in Plain Sight

Shreyas quotes the American graphic designer, Milton Glaser to aptly describe what drawing means to her: "The great benefit of drawing for instance, is when you look at something you see it for the first time…and you can spend your life without seeing anything…" She sees illustration as means to observe, document, experience and also, express. "My work usually revolves around culture and travel – both in live documentation drawing as well as finished illustrations. I connect with colors and tactility in visuals, objects and print ephemera; I look for textures and signs of a hand behind the art," she says. Her illustrations for the exhibition focused on a theme close to her heart: women's issues; in particular, she explored the notion of visibility and being hidden through the medium of veils in her works such as Hidden in Plain Sight. "Veils have a curious presence in a public space. Do they actually hide a woman or do they make her more conspicuous?" she questions.

Chandrika Marla: Textile Dance of Relationships

The Urge to Merge, acrylic and fabric on canvas, 2011 

Migrating to a new land and finding herself at a crucial crossroads in her life led to Chicago-based artist of Indian origin, Chandrika Marla to transition into the art world six years ago. A graduate of the distinguished Indian fashion school, National Institute of Fashion and Technology (NIFT), she was a former fashion designer for a Delhi export company. “I moved to States in 1998 when I got married and subsequently, began designing clothes for Disney,” Chandrika says. While she enjoyed the experience, she mentions that having to leave Disney actually proved to be a blessing in disguise.

Having sporadically painted before, she utilized the time to hone her own painting technique under the tutelage of a local French artist. Eventually, she decided to embrace art, leaving fashion behind. “Fashion and art was getting muddled up in my head...in fashion, one is always designing for the consumer and validation is based upon if a collection sold well,” she says, remarking that becoming an artist allowed her to experience a great surge of liberation and creativity.

Excluded, acrylic and oil pastel, 2009

Having been immersed in fashion for so long, Chandrika's hand would instinctively move to the familiar rhythms of sketching the female body. “I don't have a pronounced sense of realism, I am more interested in delineating humanistic figures,” she says, mentioning that the figures populating her paintings nowadays are increasingly becoming more and more anthropomorphic over time, vague and blurred in contrast to her earlier works depicting sharply defined figures.

Chandrika's art produces several questions about being an immigrant/artist, especially in context to personal preoccupations of creating and writing about one's homeland while living away from it. For an immigrant artist, how much does their motherland  influence their work (in Chandrika's case, India)? Is she intent on presenting herself as an essentially Indian artist through the basis of her work or do her roots play only a subliminal role in shaping it? Overall, is it imperative that one's immigrant identity always define one's artistic work?

Summer Fragment, acrylic, oil-pastel, and pigment on canvas, 2013

Both as a relic of her previous fashion designer avatar as well as a signature trademark, Chandrika incorporates fabric as an additional layer in her pieces to create a palimpsest of preexisting acrylics, oils, and pastels. In Sudha, for example, she cuts up a table-cloth and places it on the painting as how one would sew the pieces together, explaining, “It was like jigsawing a puzzle together.”

As India possesses incredible textile wealth, Chandrika has vast choices to feature in her work. (One example is Rajasthani block-print.) She explores fabric as means to interrogate the role of clothes in the facades that one presents to the world. In Urge to Merge (pictured first), three fabric bodices dance in a dialogue of sorts against a backdrop of warm, meditative red. Chandrika's works essentially concern themselves with the politics of relationships between women and the fabric, with paint converging to convey the layers nested inside these relationships.

Haleh Anvari: Beyond the Cliche

Image from Chador-nama

The black chador has irrevocably become what Iranian photographer and writer, Haleh Anvari describes as Iran's visual shorthand, its unregistered trademark. Haleh's quest to deconstruct and liberate the chador from reductionist stereotype occurred as a byproduct of her relationship with the foreign press reporting in Iran and that of the chador itself. Her determination to re-present the chador has resulted in the photographic projects, Chador-nama, Chador-dadar, and Peace Chador, and the performance-work, Power of Cliche.

Having studied politics and philosophy at university in UK, Haleh returned to Iran and worked as a local translator/producer for foreign journalists covering Iran. “I was a product of two cultures and it subsequently gave me license to see both sides of the coin, so to speak,” she remarks. One thing that she consistently observed while working with foreign press was that the black chador had become synonymous with Iran; regardless of the issue being reported on hand, it was the sole image being transmitted of Iran. "I was unhappy that they would see my country exclusively through that lens and I was always trying to make them see Iran differently," she says. 

"After six years of working as a 'sidekick', I started writing for myself but the Iranian authorities were not happy and subsequently, banned and threatened me," she reminsces. "I got stuck in the house with lot of bitter and depressive thoughts...and it was around that time that I received a digital camera as a birthday present."

A definitive encounter with the chador also deeply impacted her. "I was driving down a street when I saw a woman in a chador rush to me, there was so much swagger in her walk - and it made me angry! It made me think at that point how the Iranian system had somehow made me feel separate from them the way I was dressed," she says. Coming from a chadori family, Anvari mentions that as a child, she perceived it an aspirational garment, describing it as "cuddly and a safe harbor." So where did the alienation and disconnection to the chador spring up from? "Wearing the chador was no more about a personal choice of modesty; it had become a political statement instead," she says.

Image from Chador-nama

Image from Chador-dadar

Her engagement with the chador then occurred on a more emotional level, including and highlighting all that had been omitted from the chador's current avatar: color, light and movement in Chador-nama, significantly situating the chadors in the Iranian country-side. The chador then saw itself on a global journey in Chador-dadar. “If the chador had become an Irani icon, I thought of taking it to other global icons and photographing it in their midst,” she says; the project became a live installation and her journey took her to Jaipur and Agra in India, Istanbul, and Dubai [Dubai's landmark Burj al Khalifa in the background above]. “I learnt so much about the environment that I was photographing in," she mentions, elaborating that while onlookers engaged with the chador at Amber fort, Jaipur, for instance, she had had to model the chador herself in Turkey, where the chosen model declined to do due to her secular beliefs.

Fashioning Women’s Development

Editor's Note: Lisa Wong is a traditional and impact investment professional at Nikko Asset Management and co-runs the UK Chapter of the international Women Advancing Microfinance (WAM) network based out of London. Her specialties include female empowerment, inclusive business, microfinance, and green investment. An avid writer and reader, she is currently working on a creative project on the intersection between the written word and visual culture in her spare time. She holds an English MA from the University of Cambridge and Dual Degree Master of Public Administration in Public Policy and Economics from the London School of Economics and Columbia University. 

Women and fashion have a longstanding and complex relationship: often a source of joy as well as contempt. Recently, in the sleek surroundings of a London Soho art gallery, Rook and Raven, two leading female sustainable fashion experts exposed some ugly truths about fashion, and the visionary efforts underway to revolutionize the industry as part of the Women Advancing Microfinance UK speaker series.

Dr. Pamela Ravasio, winner of UK “Green Oscar,” the Observer Ethical Award, and textile supply chain expert, ranked the fashion industry as the second worst in the world in environmental and social abuse – right after agriculture. Behind the basic white tee and the darling dress, there are often stories of child labour, chemical poisoning, slavery and textile waste – to name but a few ills. Most fashion savvy consumers and creators are not purposefully inflicting such terrors on the world, Ravasio argues, but in a veil of unknowing many are ignorantly or blindly allowing a network of harm to propagate in the service of style.

When one is confronted with a t-shirt; and 2.4 billion are produced a year; one often has no idea who made it and under what conditions. A traditional conception of fashion sees that impact is measured by aesthetics and functionality, which focuses on the design level. Often designers have never been in a cotton field or a dye factory – they have no concept of the wider impact of their design decisions, or any relation to the effects they are causing. A fashion supply and distribution chain is often so fragmented that the full story of an item of clothing, from how the crop was grown, the labour conditions in which it was made to how the waste products are disposed of are rarely fully known. The button may be from Taiwan, the cotton from China, the worker from Bangladesh – the assembly line is often global and multi-partied. Ravasio revealed that 25% of the world’s pesticides are used in relation to the fashion industry – how many fashion insiders and consumers even consider this factor when faced with a new item of clothing?

Marriage: Which Voice Should a Woman Listen to?

As a woman, one is always told that they should be able to multitask. I must say that I know many women who have been able to carry out this order with no hustle. Sometimes though, there are many voices that keep on talking to women at different stages of life that they cannot seem to balance at the same time. The voices all speak to them in different tones all at once and they never give them peace. Culture, education, and religion all speak to women and give them advice about marriage and sexual reproductive health, but women don’t know which voice to listen to anymore. They are just weary of all these voices.

Image credit: ewehoo.blogspot.com

As young girls, perhaps they were told to be submissive to their husbands. Their aunts and all their female relatives who took on the role of advising them sang the same song to them. Growing up in societies that followed cultural beliefs closely, the girls were trained to be good wives. This was a normal custom in such societies and all girls had to embrace these beliefs and some pre-marriage rituals.

These rituals involved pulling the clitoris to elongate them so that they could satisfy their husbands when they came of marriage age. They were told that a woman’s ability to satisfy her husband in bed would assure her a long and gratifying marriage. Looking back, I think this seems like some absurd custom that young girls were exposed to. How could a tiny part of the woman’s body that the man could not even see when he asked her hand in marriage be the determining factor for a marriage to work? At this age the girls had no right to question their elder’s orders, they just had to obey and wait patiently to reap the results of their obedience in marriage.

Contrary to the lessons of culture, education tells women that they are equal to their male counterparts. They are now enlightened to ask questions like: If I pull my clitoris and elongate them to satisfy my husband in bed, what will my husband do that will change him physically to satisfy me in bed as well. No one from the cultural realm seems to know the answer to this question as they keep on hushing the girl’s questions with the gospel of submission.

Then, there are girls who have been educated that love is shared between two people without the need to change who you are. They have read textbooks and novels all with literature in which women from all walks of life got married and lived happily ever after despite their physical appearance. They have read of the ill effects of female genital mutilation as they have come to know the cultural practices that they were subjected to. They only wish they had not listened to the culture voice as it advised them on marriage.

Education has unshackled these women from the chains of culture and told them to be autonomous. They have gained financial independence that makes them equal partners in marriage. Their husbands are scared of such achievements that they never dreamt to occur to their life partners. When the husbands were boys they were told to take pride in protecting, providing, and professing their love to their wives. One way to profess this love was to beat their wives. Women were also told to take pride in being beaten because they were misled to believe that a beating meant that your husband loved you. The love lay in the fact that he could come back and comfort you after the beating.

Being emancipated by education, some women no longer take any beating as a sign of love. It is an absolute sign of abuse. Most women will not allow any beating to start at all. If ever a beating sees light in a marriage, most women now know legal recourse to take against these marital matters that a husband would have thought to be mightier than a discussion to warrant a beating. Where is the line drawn then between culture and education that will make a woman maintain her marriage?

How Being Forced Across Borders Causes Mental Strains

Palestinian woman stands at the entrance of her home in Bethlehem after its been shelled for the 7th time.

Caring for oneself isn't an easy task.

Imagine the burden of remaining strong so as to provide some level of stability for the rest of your family while you are continuously, against your will, forced across borders.

Currently, there are more than 15.4 million refugees in the world.

Iman was a Professor of Engineering at the University of Baghdad. In August 2005, she was left blind after being attacked along with her husband.

We met at the Caritas Migrant Center in Lebanon.

“We used to have four cars and a large house. Now we don’t earn anything and our savings have nearly run out. I am broken inside living this life of begging,” Iman said in an interview with Migrant Stories. 

“I am struggling to provide healthcare for me and my diabetic daughter. We have been driven from our homes, victimized, and even outside our country we lack security. The war is on the Iraqi people,” adds Iman.  

"I don't want charity; I want to work. I didn't ask America for this war." 

There are an estimated 27 million internally displaced people worldwide, with Sudan representing the largest population at 5 million.

Arafa Hassan is from central Sudan’s Nuba Mountains, which lies in the state of South Kordofan. As a child she dreamed of sharing her cultural heritage internationally but those aspirations vanished when she was forced to leave her homeland.

“We used to have our own language but then Arabic was forced on us. I witnessed members of my family being raped and killed,” Arafa told Migrant Stories. “Our family was driven out after the government seized our lands. Although it’s difficult living the life of a refugee, which could mean being detained or without basic needs, we had to escape persecution.”

High Chronic Neurological Disease Plagues Refugees

As the number of refugees continues to rapidly increase, health officials are shifting their focus from infectious diseases to monitoring neurological diseases that affects a high proportion of refugees exposed to various levels of mental shock.

A study conducted in 2011, which is a part of a national United Nations (UN) pilot project, says that refugees are in need of targeted neurological health services, health education for neurological disorders, and long-term and sustainable chronic disease management.

Neurological diagnoses were reported in 1,295 refugees out of 2,539 refugee visits, accounting for 17 percent of all refugees who were receiving health assistance and 4 percent of the 7,642 Iraqi refugees registered in Jordan in 2010.

The study found that 4.97 percent of refugees with neurological system disorders reported being victims of torture. Seventy-eight percent were diagnosed as chronic disorders, with nearly 70 percent of individuals originating from Baghdad.

A neurological disorder occurs when structural, biochemical or electrical abnormalities in the brain, spinal chord or in the nervous system results in common symptoms such as epilepsy, back pain, headaches, root and nerve plexus dysfunctions and strokes.

Psychological stress incurred during times of emergencies such as natural disasters, war, and being uprooted from their natural environment are major triggers that can cause disruption to the normal flow of the nervous system.

“Limited data has been collected on neurological diagnosis in terms of chronic disorders and how people live day to day as refugees,” Dr. Farrah Mateen of the Department of Neurology and International Health at John Hopkins University in Baltimore, a member of the American Academy of Neurology and lead researcher for the study told Migrant Stories. 

“Over time health services have been more geared towards infectious diseases and this data shows that in fact there are more chronic ailments that need to be looked at,” adds Dr. Mateen. 

“Understanding the neurological disorders in vulnerable displaced persons is crucial to developing sustainable policy measures to recognise and ultimately address what may be a large and lifelong burden of neurological disorders in refugee populations.”

Migrant Stories Series

Two weeks ago, I wrote a post about how the single-story robs us our dignity.

To my surprise, I was asked to do a series of excerpts from an eMagazine I created for the Her Blueprint audience titled, Migrant Stories: Tales From Women Forced Across Borders.

You can grab your copy here if you haven't already.

Migrant Stories is about Dignity. Storytelling. Respect. Awaken.

It's also about using sacred journalism to repair and heal one's dignity. Most importantly, it's about using the power of up close and in-depth storytelling to foster a culture of respect and awaken the world to one of the most pressing and under-reported issues of our time.

I look forward to sharing more stories with you.

Until then, over to you

Researchers warn that as conflict and natural disasters continue to uproot individuals, a global trend towards high chronic disease in displaced refugees could reach pandemic proportions in the coming years.

Add your voice!

What are some solutions that could be implemented to better facilitate women who have been exposed to high levels of trauma?

Either share your wisdom in the comments below or on the IMOW Facebook page.

After that, share this article so that others may join the conversation.

Dirty Ways the Single-Story Robs Our Dignity

"There is no agony like bearing an untold story inside of you." - Maya Angelou

Imagine, you're trapped in a country. Rumours are spreading that you're either an Ethiopian spy or a drug dealer. Foreigners and local alike are spreading their clout. As a last resort, you go to your embassy in hopes of assistance. Only to find that your instincts, which kept you from going earlier, are verified.

"Well we share information with the ISI (Internal Security Intelligence)," she says, while speaking in code to your lawyer. "After all, the passport is our property."

In essence, conveying a message that you are their property.

Fast-forward to a year later, you're in Cairo, your phone is hot and the embassy is keen on spreading rumours as a means of letting you know whose the master.

Never once do they bother to ask for your side of the story. In fact, nor do those who are being fed the rumours. As a result, a select few have used their power to make their story the definitive story of you. This was my story.

How the Single-Story Steals One's Dignity

Globally, world leaders, state-run, and mainstream media have left Mama Earth's children in agony. We burn with untold stories of injustice, poverty, and a desire to no longer be treated like slave labour in their factories and corporations otherwise known as countries and borders.

Have you ever felt like that?

Several months ago, I had the pleasure of discovering a TED talk by novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie that I wish to share it with you.

Here is an excerpt from the talk:

"The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story."

"Start the story with the arrows of the Native Americans, and not with the arrival of the British, and you have an entirely different story. Start the story with the failure of the African states, and not with the colonial creation of the African states, and you have an entirely different story."

Introducing Migrant Stories 

As an experiment, I've put together a short eMagazine. It's a collection of stories from women forced across borders.

I made this especially for the Her Blueprint audience.

It is my firm belief that when we stop and listen to one another's story without judgement then we're able to correct what world leaders have undone. They've torn us, the earth's citizens, apart.

Recently, the world celebrated Mother's Day but how many of you took time out to give remembrance to Mama Earth? When was the last time you sat in silence and listened to her story? Every day she speaks to us. Every day she burns in agony that she can't capture our attention long enough because she too wants to be heard.

And respected.
And adored.
As well as have her dignity restored.

Enjoy the eMagazine.  Click here to grab your copy!

Where Can You Find A Girls Only Radio for Arab Women?

Image property of: hackmanj1

Banat wa Bass or Girls Only became the region’s first online radio station catering to the issues of Arab women when it was established in April 2008. Now it has a fan base of nearly five million listeners throughout the Arab world.

I had the opportunity to speak with founder and editor in chief of Banat wa Bass, Amani Eltunsi. Here's an excerpt of our discussion.

Egyptian women, on a daily basis, deal with a lot of issues from harassment to violence to gender inequality. When I started this radio station in 2008, there were no media outlets giving voice to Arab women.

In the region, movies always portrays women as being weak. I wanted to counter this by showing women who are empowered.

At Banat wa Bass we try and concentrate on educated women simply because our educated people are non-educated due to the poor quality of Egypt's educational system.

In Egypt, there are millions of working and college girls that deal with harassment and violence either in the streets or from her family. These women need some place to express themselves. That's why I created Banat wa Bass. By conducting workshops in the universities and holding public discussions on the radio show, I'm not only informing these women on their rights but i'm also empowering them on how to use their rights.

During the revolution, I was always in Tahrir Square. Because the internet was shut off I decided to keep a diary of my thoughts and interviews with women. The end result was a book called A Girl's Wish from Tahrir Square.

The Power of the Internet

It's very expensive to create an FM radio station in Egypt. With traditional radio, there's also a lot of control where as online I can be free. In addition, government officials can't access Internet radio as easily and it also protects the listeners because they can't monitor everyone listening to the broadcast.

The beauty of the Internet is that it doesn't just limit my audience to Egypt. It gives me the opportunity to speak to the world.

However, on one occasion the national security ordered me to their office. They noticed a lot of women coming to the office and wanted to know what we're doing. I told them that I was running an Internet radio station. They didn't understand so I showed them the website. He told that if I wanted to continue my work that I can't talk about politics, sex or religion.

Time to Lend Your Voice

During my interview with Amani she expressed a desire to take Banat wa Bass to the next level. As a one woman show, Amani has had to fund this project via personal loans. If you work for an NGO or are looking to sponsor kick-ass ideas and projects then I encourage you to visit Banat wa Bass' website and contact Amani.

Check out their website! Banat wa Bass

Women Helping Women: Somalian Famine Refugees Find Relief in Neighboring Kenya

The people of Somalia are in need of so much. They need a stable government – or any government at all, really, having basically been without one for the past two decades. They need jobs, income, clothing, medical care.

But perhaps right now, more than anything, they just need a little rain.

An East Africa drought continues to plague Somalia and neighboring countries, causing a famine that’s estimated to have cost tens of thousands of Somalian residents their lives thus far. But thanks to a for-women, by-women program in northeast Kenya, some 2,700 Somalian women and their families have found a bit of relief.

Womankind Kenya, along with partners such as MADRE and Zenab for Women in Development, has provided food, water and anti-diarrheal medicine to these women and their families, in addition to counseling and medical services to women who have survived rape or robbery during the trek to Kenya.

“We counsel women who arrive traumatized from sexual violence, from being uprooted from their home communities, or from burying a child along the way,” said Hubbie Hussein al-Haji, pictured above, executive director of Womankind Kenya. “We ensure pregnant and breastfeeding women emaciated from famine receive the nutrition and health care they desperately need.”

Hussein al-Haji says the famine could be somewhat lessened if regional resources were adequately and sensibly used.

“While the worst drought in six decades has destroyed crops in the northeast, very close by in the south of Kenya, the farms are green and plentiful,” she said. “People are growing wheat, vegetables and more. But this locally-grown food is not getting to the people who need it. Meanwhile, the price of staple crops like rice, corn and wheat is shooting up. Drought means that poor people can no longer raise their own food for lack of water. If the prices go up, they can’t buy food either.”

In the meantime, women-focused partnerships will continue to help as many famine escapees as possible. MADRE recently utilized one of its partner organizations, a group of women farmers in Sudan, to deliver a crucial supplement to Womankind and the refugees it supports. Hussein al-Haji says that in addition to this help from outside organizations, creating more sustainable, locally grown food sources will be key to aiding famine victims and preventing future outbreaks.

Domestic Workers Find their Own Means of Empowerment

Chandrani speaking at a Taste Culture event

In the Middle East, where widespread abuse of female migrant domestic workers is commonplace, Jordan positioned itself as leader in protecting workers rights when it introduced laws in 2008 that called for regulated hours, a day off and criminalisation of human trafficking.

However, a recent report by the New York-based Human Rights Watch and Jordan's Tamkeen Centre for Legal Aid cites complaints of physical and sexual abuse, house confinement, non-payment of salaries and long working hours.

According to the 110-page report, failure on the part of Jordanian officials to enforce labour laws put in place to protect female migrants are in fact 'facilitating abuse'.

Currently, more than 70,000 female migrant domestic workers from Sri Lanka, Indonesia and the Philippines are employed in the kingdom.

Pushed by a need to support their families, female migrant domestic workers leave their countries, children and lives to care for another household.

The issue of migrant domestic work is a personal issue for me. More than fifteen years ago while living on the streets in the United States and without any legal identification, I turned to cleaning houses as a means of supporting myself. When I lived in the home, I usually slept on the sofa and worked all the day without receiving a single pay. For these individuals, providing me with a place to sleep was sufficient enough. At times, I was subjected to verbal abuse and even sometimes molestation. Eventually, I would run away and end up on the streets once more.

Five years ago, when I arrived in the Middle East from New York it was not my intention to highlight the plight of these women. However, my treatment in Lebanon--when I was viewed as a servant whenever I walked the streets, or sleeping on the sofa in the home of three fellow foreigners, cooking and cleaning in exchange for board--triggered something in me.

Tunisia Revolt Though the Eyes of its Youth

photo property of: Crethi Plethi

Rising unemployment has struck a nerve with many young Tunisians who hoped that their successful 'Jasmine Revolt,' which forced former dictator Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali to Saudi Arabia on January 14, would quickly result in rapid job growth. Tunisia's post-revolutionary blues has caused many Tunisians to lose confidence in the progress of their revolt but for 21-year-old Myriam Ben Ghazi the revolution is just beginning.

"Small protests or gatherings expressing discontent against the regime of Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali had never happened before in Tunisia, so when the revolution started, I freaked because for twenty-three years we were never allowed to express our opinions publicly. I wondered if this would really work or if people’s lives would be lost for nothing.

I think that the turning point for us was that we finally saw the corruption; even though we always knew that it existed, it was the norm to just look away.  When people went to the streets to demand change, it was clear we were finally facing it.

We had to face it, because remounts of Ben Ali's Democratic Constitutional Rally (RCD) party are still working behind the scenes in the government and in the judiciary. The best example would be the trials and sentencing of Ben Ali and his wife Leila Trabelsi in absentia. Orchestrating their trials is really a piece of theatre, because they're off enjoying their life in Saudi Arabia while we continue suffering from poverty. But for the public it’s kind of a drug that government gives us to keep us quiet.

As a young Tunisian, I started think about what young people need to do in order to keep the country on a path towards democracy. Since I don’t know how to take up arms and fight, I decided to continue the struggle as a writer through journalism so that I can bring the voices of young people to the outside world.

I think the revolution will take a long time, but the real revolution that we need right now is one of the mind, because the only way we will be able to progress forward is if people start to make changes within themselves. Even after the revolution people are still thinking with the same mentality of the past and believing that nothing has really changed. But we have gained our freedom, we're facing corruption, and in the time we'll grow economically. What's important now is that focus on the October 23 elections, where Tunisians will be able to elect a constituent assembly to reform the constitution. The last time our constitution was amended was nine years ago, after the Tunisian constitutional referendum of 2002.

For me voting is another way that we as young people will be able to continue changing Tunisia by our own hand, rather than others making the decisions for us.

As for the international media, they are always looking for the latest scoop and hot news so if there is war happening in Libya and Tunisia is calming down then they will look to Libya of course instead of really exploring the intricate details of what is going on in Tunisia. However, right now we don’t need the media to be all over us we just need to focus on our own issues, concentrate on the elections and establish democracy in Tunisia. Then once Tunisia becomes an economic success then the media will look at Tunisia as the place that started the Arab Spring two or three years ago and hail the country for all the economic, social and political changes."

Tunisia: Faced With a Life in Limbo

Photo credit: NY Times

NATO's five month bombing campaign in Libya under the guise of protecting civilians has not only caused major disruptions to the lives of thousands of Libyan civilians but it has also taken its toll on countless numbers of refugees from sub-Saharan Africa who took up refuge in Libya after fleeing violence and persecution in their own countries.

In this two part series I'll introduce two young women whose lives were turned upside down when the "Arab Spring" reached Libya, and explore how they've managed to overcome their obstacles while faced with a life in limbo.

Twenty-year-old Eiman and her family was living a fairly good life in Libya before the war hit. Her parents, originally from Darfur, fled to Libya where Eiman and her brothers and sister were born.

At the time of the conflict, Eiman was in her third year of university where she was pursuing a degree in agronomy and nutrition but those dreams had to be put on hold as the situation worsened.

"We were so scared when fighting erupted between pro and anti-Gaddafi forces on my street because we could hear the guns, people were shouting and everyone was running from one area to the next trying to find safety," explains Eiman in an interview with Her Blueprint. "The security situation became unbearable when NATO started bombing and eventually we fled to Tunisia. My father who was in Benghazi working at the time of the fighting had to flee to Egypt and we're waiting for him to join us here in Tunisia."

Located in the middle of the desert along the main Libyan coastal highway leading to Tripoli just east of the southern Tunisian border crossing of Ras Ajdir, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) run Shousha camp has become home to thousands of refugees like Eiman since the outbreak of the Libyan war.

For most inhabitants of the camp, daily life has become difficult.

African Women Fall Victim to a New Form of Slavery

Slavery is very much a part of today’s global economy. It rivals and in some regions eclipses the international drug trade. There are nearly twenty-seven million slaves worldwide, generating $1.3 billionin annual profits. Some estimates show a world slave population as high as two hundred million.

During previous eras where slavery was common, the new owner was given a deed or title to its newly acquired property similar to the receipt a cashier hands over to the customer whose recently purchased goods.

The kafeel system could be likened to that deed or title in that the labour sending countries agree to the relinquishing of their workers passports upon arrival in the destination country. The kafeel or kafala system is a sponsorship system that only allows expatriate workers to enter, work in, and leave certain countries with the permission of their sponsor or employers, who are locals to that country. It's common in countries such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia, where migrant domestic workers are common.

According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), there are an estimated six million women working as maids in the Middle East. African countries like Ethiopia, Madagascar, Sudan as well as other various East and West African countries provide the bulk of household and cleaning services.

Languishing in Injustice

The main women’s prison in Lebanon’s northern city of Tripoli maintains a stagnant pool of migrant women many, who have spent more than a year awaiting the possibility of having their cases being brought before a judge. Few have access to institutional support from their embassies or consulates.

Waiting outside were two female Lebanese prison guards who were not exactly thrilled to see visitors.

“They have a gang ranking system in here and the Blacks are on the lowest level and the Filipinos are on the higher level,” says one Ethiopian detainee in her native language of Amharic. “The guards tell us to call our families so that they will send us money, which would make our time in jails easier.”

With tears in their eyes, the women press their hands against the glass barrier: physical contact with visitors is forbidden for inmates but this simple gesture signals their gratitude at the simple gifts of food, clothes, shampoo and feminine products brought to them by Yurda - a self-proclaimed social worker, community leader and domestic worker who has been in Lebanon for over eleven years – who has dedicated her free time to organizing donations.

Mixed in with criminals and murderers, many of these women were caught on the streets without papers after running away from their employers because of abuse, rape, starvation, forced confinement or accused of stealing.

“Female migrant workers are losing years off their lives by sitting in detention and one way of preventing this is by allowing the worker to keep their aqama (working papers) and original passport and let the employer retain the photocopy,” says Kenyan activist Naimeh Pelot.

Modern Day Slavery

Lacking legal protections, domestic workers are among the most exploited and abused workers in the world.

Rights advocates have long argued that exclusion from labour laws and recruitment-related abuses has left domestic workers in the Middle East vulnerable to exploitation, sexual abuse, forced labour, debt bondage, trafficking and conditions akin to slavery.

However, a new ILO Convention on Domestic Workers adopted in June aims to ensure that these women are treated as human beings.

“When male migrant workers come to work in construction or other service and industry sectors in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states, they are protected under the labour law. Even if they don’t have full rights their work is recognized as work under the law, which is not the case for domestic workers,” said Simel Esim, Gender Specialist in the ILO's Regional Office for the Arab States in an interview.

“Jordan and Lebanon are the only countries where Ministries of Labour are in charge of a significant number of the institutional responsibilities regarding migrant domestic workers,” adds Esim.

“In the case of the GCC countries the oversight of domestic workers is under the jurisdiction of the Ministries of Interior instead of the Ministries of Labour, which leaves domestic workers outside the purview of the labour law. The emphasis on domestic workers is, therefore about their recognition as workers, with equal rights to workers in other sectors.”

The new convention requires governments to regulate private employment agencies that impose heavy debt burdens or misinform migrant domestic workers about their jobs, prohibit the practice of deducting domestic workers’ salaries to pay recruitment fees, investigate complaints and labour inspection in private homes.

Today recruitment agencies eager to cash in on this lucrative labour market lure these vulnerable women into debt bondage. Rights groups report that agency fees ranging from $200 to $400, must be paid before departure. However, for most women their first few salaries go toward repaying the debt.

“Policies relating to trafficking need to fall more in line with the reality of forced migration globally because most migrant workers are not the stereotypical sex worker chained to a bed,” Pardis Mahdavi, author of "Gridlock: Labour, Migration and Human Trafficking" said. “In fact they are men and women that are tied to metaphorical chains like debt and poverty that forces these workers to migrate and remain in poor working conditions.”

The Lives of Contemporary Afghan Women

[Editor's Note: The following post was written by Ashraf Zahedi, co-editor of Land of the Unconquerable: The Contemporary Lives of Afghan Women. Zahedi, along with contributor Amina Kator and moderator Kavita Ramdas, former CEO of the Global Fund for Women, will appear in conversation for an IMOW event next week, July 27. More information about the event can be found here.]

Photo by Sheryl Shapiro from Land of the Unconquerable: The Contemporary Lives of Afghan Women

The news from Afghanistan is not always promising. Yet despite hardships and horrors, life in Afghanistan continues. How are women faring against the odds? Sadly, gradually, it seems that many people in the West, so enthusiastic about liberating (and unveiling) Afghan women, have lost interest. The vast numbers of NGOs, so ubiquitous in the beginning, have decreased rapidly, especially in the neediest rural areas, which have become more and more dangerous for foreign aid workers. The Afghan government has little or no power outside the capital city. The Western media has reduced its presence and unless the news is sensational, reports of reconstruction and of how Afghans are coping are progressively more sporadic.

What explains this shift in the West’s socio-political and economic commitments? The short answer lies in limited understanding of Afghanistan and its complexity. Outsiders’ slanted and ahistorical views of Afghanistan and their dichotomous constructs of Afghan men as oppressors and Afghan women as oppressed have portrayed an unrealistic view of Afghan society and its gender relations. In many ways the hyped political promises and idealistic social policies have not served Afghan women well.

In Land of the Unconquerable: The Lives of Contemporary Afghan Women, Jennifer Heath and Ashraf Zahedi examine the reality of life for women today in Afghanistan. They explore what has been done for Afghan women through the efforts of governmental and non-governmental organization, and, most importantly, they consider how Afghan women themselves are rising to the immense challenges, how they envision and plan to meet the future.

Heath and Zahedi examine the complexities of Afghan women’s lives and approach the situation holistically, understanding that Afghanistan is made up of women and men whose suffering and triumphs are interwoven. Land of the Unconquerable draws on the diverse expertise of accomplished scholars, as well as humanitarian workers. These writers contextualize the structural and cultural impediments to Afghan women’s advancement -- as determined by Afghan women themselves. The book offers a large and full picture: historical background leading to insights, observations, and narratives of women’s lives in the present, and comprehensive solutions and social policy recommendations in chapters about the constitution, law, leadership and gender policy, mental and physical health, education, economics, family life and more. These writers propose potential short- and long-term solutions, requiring national and international commitments and resource allocation.

What needs to be done after ten years of engagement with Afghanistan is not withdrawal of support but its further expansion. But this time the aim should be to improve Afghan people’s lives through social measures that are driven by the Afghans themselves and not by the national or international donors. Long-term solutions should take precedence over short-term measures with no lasting impact. Today, more than ever before, Afghan women need non-Afghan support to secure their gains over the past decade and further build on them.