Welcome to Her Blueprint, the newly re-launched blog from the International Museum of Women! Her Blueprint will be a space where members of the IMOW team and community can explore ideas, share stories, and voice opinions about art, culture, news, and issues that are on our minds now. We hope it can be a space where a broad range of perspectives can be shared and discussed—from our resident historian and academic, Karen Offen, sharing her perspectives on women’s history, to our executive director, Clare Winterton, talking about pop culture issues that have made her think twice. (Check out our Contributors page to learn more about the women who are currently sharing ideas on Her Blueprint.)
Her Blueprint will also take you behind the scenes of what’s happening at the Museum, feature artists from our community, and more. And of course, we want to hear from you! Leave a comment on stories you like (or disagree with!), send us an email at team@imow.org, and be sure to subscribe to our RSS feed to stay up to date with all the posts from Her Blueprint.
Thank you for your support! Go get ‘em, girls!
United Nations Creates a New Women's Rights Coalition
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| A group of Pokot women in Chemeril Dam, Kenya. |
After four tense years of negotiations between global advocates and UN Member states, the United Nations has established UN Women, an organization combining four previous UN women’s rights groups, to fight for gender equality and the empowerment of women.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said, “UN Women will significantly boost UN efforts to promote gender equality, expand opportunity, and tackle discrimination around the globe.”
Over the United Nations’s 65-year history, its primary objectives have centered on “gender mainstreaming,” or the promotion of gender equality through legislative initiatives and special programs. The UN’s focus on women began with the establishment of the Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW) in 1946.
While there has been a steady increase of government commitment to women's rights in the developing world, critics argue that many of the UN’s initiatives have been signed into legislation without further monitoring or even implementation. And while women comprise the majority of the population—as well as the world’s most impoverished—they are direly lacking in representation on an international scale.
According to UNIFEM, women provide 70 percent of agricultural labor and produce more than 90 percent of the food in some regions of the globe. Yet women earn 10 percent of the world’s income and own one percent of the world’s property.
With so much on the line for women struggling under global financial collapse, will the new coalition go beyond the UN’s initial aims of “gender mainstreaming” in order to create real change?
While the organization will not get to work until January 2011, Secretary-General Ban is currently inviting suggestions as to who should be appointed Under-Secretary-General to head UN Women. Member states and civil society partners are more likely to choose a leader from the non-Western, developing world, where international legislation is sorely needed. According to Amnesty International, maternal deaths in the US rose from 6.6 per 100,000 pregnancies and births in 1987 to 13.3 percent in 2006. While in South Asia, some 300 to 400 maternal deaths have been reported for every 100,000 pregnancies and births.
Former Chilean president Michelle Bachelet rumored to be a top choice for Under-Secretary-General.
BIG IDEAS: Macro Solutions
"Around the world, women's work is unrewarding work: it means low pay and long hours. Women farmers don't own the land they cultivate. Women factory workers are paid less and often intimidated, sexually harassed or exploited. Female domestic workers are not unionized and face a high risk of trafficking and other exploitation, particularly if they are undocumented members of the "grey" economy.
...Women must be empowered as economic players across the spectrum--as laborers, managers, entrepreneurs and investors.
So what does this mean? What would it take to integrate women across the economic spectrum? It's certainly a tall order. We must reframe the way we think about economics, asking at every turn 'Where are the women?'"What do you think? Is microfinance good enough? What are some other ways that women can be empowered to work as true change-agents in the global economy? Is it a matter of changing our mindset, or are there other hurdles to overcome, too?
Women Need Macro Solutions, Too [Economica: Women and the Global Economy]
WOMEN OF THE WORLD: Anki King
You're a pretty prolific artist. What's been inspiring you lately?
I primarily work from images that appear in my inner mind. Like dreams, they are results of what I see around me, memories, feelings, emotions and thoughts. So I guess everything is part of what inspires me! I also do some space specific work as I often get inspired by a place or a room. When that happens I just see the work right there in the space and then try to find ways of creating it.
1000 Words: The Business of Women
Photo Credit: Hazel Thompson
A young Arab woman in Qatar goes shopping in a modern mall while wearing a traditional hijab, from the Economica slideshow The Business of Women, in the Business Leadership section.
CLIO TALKS BACK: Mothers’ Charter of Rights – 1930
To commemorate Mother’s Day 2010, Clio has revisited her files.
For centuries women have argued for better conditions for maternity. But problems remain – and not only in the “developing” world.
The Mothers’ Charter of Rights (1930) is a manifesto produced by the International Council of Women in 1930. It was “drawn up by Dr. Thuillier-Landry [France] and accepted by [the Public Health Standing] Committee for submission to Council and now approved by Council at Vienna for circulation to National Councils for their consideration and adaptation to their own condition.” (I.C.W. Report, 1930, p. 641). The study mandate of the I.C.W.’s Public Health Standing Committee for the years 1925-1930 included a number of questions about maternal mortality, infant death, and ill heath of children, international cooperative efforts, and recreation and playgrounds for children.
Eighty years have since passed, and the physical and mental health of mothers and children worldwide still leaves a great deal to be desired.
What are the best ways of taking action to resolve these ongoing problems?
MOTHERS’ CHARTER OF RIGHTS[1930]
The International Council of Women representing more than 40 millions of women belonging to 45 different countries makes the following Declaration:
1. Every Mother who courageously accepts maternity has a right to respect.
The woman who accepts the responsibility of suffering and duties of maternity should be respected by all.
Habitual modes of designation and customs should not expose the unmarried mother to a lack of respect from her child.
2. Every mother has the right to conditions that secure her own and her child’s health.
In order that the mother should obtain maintenance, rest and cure which will enable her to bring into the world a healthy and vigorous child without maternity entailing privation or preventable suffering ---
(a) The mother should be able to take necessary rest before and after child-birth whilst receiving adequate subsistence allowance to ensure her livelihood, and without her contract of employment being cancelled.
(b) She should receive at Clinics, Hostels, or Hospitals prenatal instruction, and instruction in the care of infants, and the care necessary to her condition, and should be welcomed when indigent, deserted, or suffering from illness.
(c) She should be able to give birth to her child either in hospital or at home with the guarantee of free medical and nursing assistance in case of need.
3. Every mother has the right to nurse and care for her child. In order that the mother may accomplish her primary duty of nursing and bringing up her child, she should be guided in this task and have the assistance of qualified organisations and be enabled to claim the necessary time. Time alloted to this purpose should be taken out of working hours for mothers engaged in work and should not result in diminution of pay.
4. Every mother has the right to maintenance and education for her child.
(a) The married mother should be able to claim that a sufficient share of the husband’s income should be allocated to the education and maintenance of the children according to their needs and number.
(b) The unmarried, deserted, or divorced mother should be able to gain practical recognition of the father’s responsibility and to obtain from him a share in the cost of maintenance and education of the child.
(c) In the absence of sufficient financial resources the mother should receive from the community the necessary assistance to enable her to maintain and educate her child.
5. Every mother has the same rights over her child as the father. “Parental” should be substituted for “Paternal” powers, and the rights of the mother in matters of guardianship, education, religion, choice of profession, etc., of the child should be equal to those of the father.
6. Every mother has the right to take part in the public affairs of her country as the destiny of her child depends thereon.
Women suffrage and the participation of women in public affairs enables the mother to exert her influence on all questions of hygiene, education, military service, and of War and Peace between the nations.
Source: “Mother’s Charter of Rights,” International Council of Women. Report on the Quinquennial Meeting, Vienna, 1930, ed. The Marchioness of Aberdeen and Temair, President of the I.C.W. (Tarland, Aberdeenshire, Scotland: International Council of Women, n.d.), pp. 641-643.
For centuries women have argued for better conditions for maternity. But problems remain – and not only in the “developing” world.
The Mothers’ Charter of Rights (1930) is a manifesto produced by the International Council of Women in 1930. It was “drawn up by Dr. Thuillier-Landry [France] and accepted by [the Public Health Standing] Committee for submission to Council and now approved by Council at Vienna for circulation to National Councils for their consideration and adaptation to their own condition.” (I.C.W. Report, 1930, p. 641). The study mandate of the I.C.W.’s Public Health Standing Committee for the years 1925-1930 included a number of questions about maternal mortality, infant death, and ill heath of children, international cooperative efforts, and recreation and playgrounds for children.
Eighty years have since passed, and the physical and mental health of mothers and children worldwide still leaves a great deal to be desired.
What are the best ways of taking action to resolve these ongoing problems?
MOTHERS’ CHARTER OF RIGHTS[1930]
The International Council of Women representing more than 40 millions of women belonging to 45 different countries makes the following Declaration:
1. Every Mother who courageously accepts maternity has a right to respect.
The woman who accepts the responsibility of suffering and duties of maternity should be respected by all.
Habitual modes of designation and customs should not expose the unmarried mother to a lack of respect from her child.
2. Every mother has the right to conditions that secure her own and her child’s health.
In order that the mother should obtain maintenance, rest and cure which will enable her to bring into the world a healthy and vigorous child without maternity entailing privation or preventable suffering ---
(a) The mother should be able to take necessary rest before and after child-birth whilst receiving adequate subsistence allowance to ensure her livelihood, and without her contract of employment being cancelled.
(b) She should receive at Clinics, Hostels, or Hospitals prenatal instruction, and instruction in the care of infants, and the care necessary to her condition, and should be welcomed when indigent, deserted, or suffering from illness.
(c) She should be able to give birth to her child either in hospital or at home with the guarantee of free medical and nursing assistance in case of need.
3. Every mother has the right to nurse and care for her child. In order that the mother may accomplish her primary duty of nursing and bringing up her child, she should be guided in this task and have the assistance of qualified organisations and be enabled to claim the necessary time. Time alloted to this purpose should be taken out of working hours for mothers engaged in work and should not result in diminution of pay.
4. Every mother has the right to maintenance and education for her child.
(a) The married mother should be able to claim that a sufficient share of the husband’s income should be allocated to the education and maintenance of the children according to their needs and number.
(b) The unmarried, deserted, or divorced mother should be able to gain practical recognition of the father’s responsibility and to obtain from him a share in the cost of maintenance and education of the child.
(c) In the absence of sufficient financial resources the mother should receive from the community the necessary assistance to enable her to maintain and educate her child.
5. Every mother has the same rights over her child as the father. “Parental” should be substituted for “Paternal” powers, and the rights of the mother in matters of guardianship, education, religion, choice of profession, etc., of the child should be equal to those of the father.
6. Every mother has the right to take part in the public affairs of her country as the destiny of her child depends thereon.
Women suffrage and the participation of women in public affairs enables the mother to exert her influence on all questions of hygiene, education, military service, and of War and Peace between the nations.
Source: “Mother’s Charter of Rights,” International Council of Women. Report on the Quinquennial Meeting, Vienna, 1930, ed. The Marchioness of Aberdeen and Temair, President of the I.C.W. (Tarland, Aberdeenshire, Scotland: International Council of Women, n.d.), pp. 641-643.
HOPE FOR HAITI
"I’m hopeful about Haiti because by just four weeks after the quake, there were already women setting up tables, showing support to each other, offering help. That resilience, that re-emerging of women as caregivers for the sick and elderly, as people who draw communities together—the women’s movement for Haiti is still there. If we can find ways to help the Haitian women rebuild their movement, the movement will be a tremendous power for change." --Liesl Gerntholtz
CLIO TALKS BACK: How long have women been campaigning for equal pay for equal work?
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Vintage News Source Photos Martina G. Kramers |
Clio finds evidence of this demand for centuries!!! Women in Europe were particularly vocal on the subject, since commercial and industrial development happened there first.
Let’s read the words of a Dutch woman, Martina G. Kramers (1863-1935), a seasoned multilingual activist in the international movement for women’s suffrage and organizer of the “International Correspondence.”
Below you will find what Kramers wrote about “equal pay for equal work” in early 1918, at the end of one of the world’s bloodiest and most costly wars.
Due to sustained pressure by feminist lobbyists at the end of the war, the political leaders who negotiated the Treaty of Versailles did include a provision on behalf of equal pay for equal work, and the treaty made specific provision for the inclusion of women in the work of the International Labour Organization and the League of Nations. But it was one thing to put the words into a treaty and another thing to make them a reality – as we know all too well today. Equal pay for equal work is no April Fool’s joke but an essential requirement enroute to gender equity.
*****
Here is Martina G. Kramers (1918):
“This [equal pay for equal work] is a question of paramount interest for all women, and it is sure to receive the greatest attention from women in governing bodies, and, indeed, from all enfranchised women......
“From the moment women began to take men’s places in industrial work, the question of equal output and equal pay, irrespective of the sex of the worker, has become a burning one. But its solution is beset with great difficulties. First, there is the exact equality of the work, for it is not always as with the work of a tram or ‘bus conductor, which is incontestably the same as the man’s whose place the woman has taken; and then there is the desire of the worker herself to be engaged by the employer, which makes her agree to have her output valued less than her predecessor’s for the sake of the paltry wage so sadly needed. There are endless stratagems that make it possible to elude the enforcement of the seeming simple principle, equal pay for equal work.
“In order to have their claim heard and their demand enforced, women workers will have to organise, if possible internationally. But that is no easy thing to do, even if we can have an International Women’s Congress at the conclusion of peace.
“Among the old conventions and “scraps of paper” turn up by the war, the first that disappeared or were disregarded were the labour laws, limitations of hours, obligations of employers with regard to conditions of labour, etc. With these disappeared the women’s disabilities and restrictions, and in the belligerent countries women flocked to the munition and other trades. It was easy to explain their small salaries by their being untaught and unskilled.
“Now, since 1911, there exists an International Correspondence of women that has for its object the promotion of labour legislation which shall not put more restrictions upon women as compared with men workers than is strictly necessary for the protection of motherhood. At present the writer of this article is its International Secretary, and ten countries have appointed Correspondents. At the outbreak of the war our sphere of action changed, and the majority of the Correspondents with whom we could remain in contact agreed to take up the question of equal pay for equal work. Unfortunately, it is not an easy matter to get exact and exhaustive statistics on women’s work and wages ; only France, Denmark and Switzerland have contributed information. Mme. Duchêne sent a most interesting pamphlet from Paris, stating the wages women got in the first year of the war, when they replaced men, and relating the establishment of a Committee against the Sweating of Women, consisting of six men’s trade unions. In Denmark a State Commission was appointed to deal with the question of a bonus to help men and women State employees through the crisis. From Switzerland we hear than in the tailoring, printing, and metal trades women are paid less than men. In Holland this is also the case, but in general the State awards the same salary to men or women employees, only giving women less chances of advancement.
“The International correspondence received from the Fédération Féministe Universitaire de France a list of resolutions passed by several meetings and unions in many lands, all advocating equal pay irrespective of sex. We are thankful that these show the movement to be an international one; but our object is to obtain statistics as well, and these seem to be difficult to get. The Trade Unions Congress at Berne in 1917, attended only by delegates from the Central and the neutral States, declared itself in favour of equal pay for equal output, which in the case of women may mean longer time.
“Congresses, especially international ones, have power to impose their decisions; our International Correspondence is content to collect information on the subject of equal pay for equal work.”
Source: Martina G. Kramers, “Equal Pay for Equal Work,” Jus Suffragii: The International Woman Suffrage News, 12:6 (1 March 1918), p. 86.
Further reading: Biografisch Woordenboek van het Socialisme en de Arbeidersbeweging in Nederland, s.v. Kramer, Martina Gezina.
MAKE CHANGE: Shop Your Values
I'm definitely guilty of online shopping...and I usually feel guilty after making an impulsive purchase while sitting at my computer. But here's one way to shop and feel good about supporting a cause you care about: Purchase gifts for others or, ahem, yourself, from Global Goods Partners and you can feel good in the knowledge that what you're buying is not only beautiful and unique, but supporting the woman artisan in a developing country who created it.
Visit Global Goods Partners>>
Quick Reads
On the 2nd Annual Ada Lovelace Day, here's a quick round-up of women's news from around the globe:
* A new book by Columbia University Professor Jane Waldfogel claims that, despite widespread belief that Britain's welfare programs are broken, the U.K. is actually eclipsing the U.S. in successfully fighting poverty. Waldfogel told the Guardian: "It's just not right. Progress in the United States stalled in 2000 and then child poverty rises again. The gloom and doom about the state of children and families in Britain is not justified by the data."
Britain leads in war on poverty, according to US academic
*A new law for the Iraq parliament mandates a one-fourth majority of its seats for female politicians. As the final results of the March 7 election trickle in this week, some female candidates are questioning whether the new quota will really advance women in Iraqi politics: "As long as there is a quota, people perceive women as gap-fillers and not deserving members of parliament," Maysoun al Damlouji told the Christian Science Monitor. "The perception of a man is as an individual, but for women it's as a bloc. So if one woman failed, it's as if the entire womanhood has failed."
Iraq election increases women in parliament – regardless of vote count [The Christian Science Monitor]
Woman Artist Wins Prize for....Women Artists?
Andrea Buttner
This week, artist Andrea Buttner of London and Frankfurt was announced as the winner of the Max Mara Prize for Women Artists. Receiving the prize means that Buttner, who works in mixed media (including antiquated items such as woodcuts and pressed flowers), will have the chance to disseminate her work more broadly, as well as take part in a 6-month residency program in Italy. But what about this distinction of the prize being "for women artists"? Are gender-separated prizes like the Max Mara still necessary? Are there implications that men and women artists should be judged separately, by different standards?
A fundraiser for Rush Limbaugh
It's true, we here at I.M.O.W. have actually found a charitable cause benefiting Rush Limbaugh that we can stand behind.In response to the conservative radio host's claims that he would move to Costa Rica if health care reform passed in America, two "dudes living in Brooklyn," unaffiliated with any non-profit organization, have decided to begin raising funds so that the shock jock can do just that.
If Limbaugh refuses the first class plane ticket, all proceeds will go directly to Planned Parenthood, according to the site. Irony alert: Rush Limbaugh's proposal is to leave the country in order to protest expanded health care coverage for America by moving to a country that provides its citizens with universal health care.
Does the on-air personality do much research before making evocative announcements to the world? Our guess is no.
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