Global Roundup: “Patriarchy on Trial”, Interfaith Women’s Choir, Women’s Legal Equality in Zanzibar, West African Women Farmers, LGBTQ+ Crisis Line
Global Roundup: “Patriarchy on Trial”, Interfaith Women’s Choir, Women’s Legal Equality in Zanzibar, West African Women Farmers, LGBTQ+ Crisis Line
Curated by FG Contributor Inaara Merani
(KX Calgary)
To celebrate International Women’s Day earlier this month, a group of performers put on a show titled “Patriarchy on Trial”. Hosted by a group called the Calgary Rolling Crones, based out of Calgary, Canada, the production was meant to challenge the social structure of patriarchy in a unique and creative way.
Our group is the ‘Calgary Rolling Crones’. And we’re trying to reappropriate the name ‘crones’ to mean wise woman, not an old hag. – Loretta Biasutti, performer
The 45-minute performance focuses on a woman who finds herself in a courtroom in her dream, and soon realizes the case being tried is about the patriarchy. Three witnesses testify against the patriarchy: Eve from the Garden of Eden, time-traveling healer and herbalist Emma Amethyst, and Jane Doe, an overworked mother in today’s world. The onus is on the audience, or the jury, to pass judgement to determine whether or not the patriarchy is guilty.
The Calgary Rolling Crones performed their show four times during the week of International Women’s Day in various locations across Calgary. The production included music and dialogue, and performers adapted their screen names from seasoned musicians.
We’re raising our voices up and showing how our world can be a better place if we have all voices involved. – Shannon Hutchison, performer
Trubys Abrahamic Women's Choir performs songs from Judaism, Islam and Christianity. (BBC)
In Milton Keynes, a city located northwest of London in the UK, Trubys Abhamic Women’s Choir brings together women from Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. The women sing together, and learn from one another to gain new perspectives and create lasting bonds.
The choir currently has 30 members and performs songs from Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Last week, the group performed at an interfaith Ramadan event, The Great Get Together Iftar. Kurshida Mirza, founder of Trubys Abrahamic Women’s Choir, said that the group also became a space for members to work through the emotional period surrounding the Israel-Gaza conflict.
We’ve sat in a room together and managed to find words to talk about it, without ever feeling that we’re not loved by each other. It’s been much easier than you think because we came together accepting there is so much that unites us. We’re going through a terrible emotional time…but our group brings together women from these three different faiths. – Kurshida Mirza
The choir was initially given funding to create a sound piece exploring women’s spiritual experiences, however after the funding ended, the group members were motivated to continue the choir, and so it continued. Now, the choir brings together women of different backgrounds who wish to find deeper connections to their faiths and create bonds with other women.
If we can come together and sing together, then it’s possible in the Middle East too. We can keep hold of that dream and it keeps us from feeling despair. We are forging bonds between women, but also between these three faiths that have so much in common with each other. We're not opposites, we’re all one, united. – Lynda Gilbert, choir member
Founding member and executive director of the Zanzibar Female Lawyers Association (ZAFELA) and the Zanzibar Gender Coalition, Jamila Mahmoud Juma. PHOTO | COURTESY. (The Citizen)
Jamila Mahmoud Juma is the founding member and executive director of the Zanzibar Female Lawyers Association (ZAFELA) and the Zanzibar Gender Coalition. Her journey as a women’s rights activist did not begin when she started her career, but rather when she was just a child, and learned to take care of her siblings as the oldest. She always wanted to help and defend her peers.
Today, Jamila is a lawyer by profession and is also an activist for human rights, particularly women’s and childrens’ rights. In Zanzibar, she has been involved in local and international legal matters regarding gender-based violence. Jamila has more than 20 years of experience in leadership, administration, lobbying, advocacy, and policy analysis.
It was her motivation to continuously support women’s rights which led her to establish ZAFELA. The collective has become a platform to support women and children, with programmes that focus on how women can become empowered, champion their rights, and become leaders. There are also programs that incorporate skills development for girls in primary and secondary school.
It was important to establish ZAFELA as a platform to help women and children. Through branding ZAFELA, I was able to build my confidence and determine what skills I needed to focus on to move my career. – Jamila Mahmoud Juma
Since its creation, the organization has seen success for its members. Many of the youth who were trained by ZAFELA as volunteers, are employed in different places around Zanzibar. Additionally, last year, ZAFELA helped host the Women Lawyers Regional Conference where women from different African countries came together to discuss legal issues.
Still, Jamila has experienced the challenges that have come with being a women’s rights champion. She says that the most challenging part of her work is not having enough support from people, even for positive outcomes. However, despite the negativity, she says that she continues to soldier on with ZAFELA rather than let people’s negativity drag her down.
My leading style is authoritative and participative through collective or sometimes individual involvement in mentorship, discussion, and the decision-making process. We are collaborative and accountable for every moment we make. – Jamila Mahmoud Juma
Mariama Sonko poses in the seed hut of her agro-ecological training center in the Casamance village of Niaguis, Senegal, Wednesday, March 7, 2024. AP Photo/Sylvia’s Cherkaoui
Women farmers in Senegal make up 70 percent of the agricultural workforce and produce 80 percent of the crops in the country, yet they have little access to land, education, and finance compared to men. One woman in Senegal is trying to change this as she believes that there is a ripple effect that is felt through communities when women are given land, responsibilities, and resources.
Mariama Sonko is the current president of the rural women’s rights movement in West Africa, We Are the Solution, which is headquartered in Niaguis, Senegal. In this quiet village, 115,000 women farmers have joined We Are the Solution. The collective is training women farmers who traditionally do not have access to education or land ownership, explaining their rights to them, and is also financing women-led agricultural projects.
Sonko grew up watching her mother struggle after her father died and believes that if she had ownership of land, she could have provided support. Instead, Sonko had to abandon her studies and leave her ancestral home to get married at a young age. When she was 19, Sonko and a group of friends convinced a landowner to rent them a small plot of land in return for part of their harvest. They planted fruit trees and opened a market garden, but they were kicked off the land five years later once the trees were full.
With the support of her husband before he passed away in 1997, she began to invest in other women. Just recently, Sonko and her team trained over 100 women from Senegal, Guinea-Bissau, and Gambia in agroforestry and micro gardening. We Are the Solution bought irrigation equipment, seeds, and fencing and helped women access land for a market garden. This is one of more than 50 projects that the organization is financing across this West African region.
Many of the participating women discussed how they have benefitted from the program, learning more about resilient farming practices and how to get and secure land ownership, as well as engaging in traditional farming practices. As these women continue to learn and grow, Sonko is actively supporting their journeys while she also is in the process of setting up seven other farming centres across southern Senegal.
Image via the Crisis Text Line
In the U.S., LGBTQ+ rights are under attack in extreme ways, and it does not seem like there is an end in sight. Recognizing the need to support LGBTQ+ mental health as lawmakers continuously target the community, national telehealth platform FOLX Health and the Crisis Text Line have partnered to create a crisis line for the queer and trans communities.
Given the world that we live in today, where every day as members of this community, we wake up to a new onslaught of laws or rhetoric that is aimed at taking us down, that has a profound impact on our mental health and well-being. [The text line] really just allows folks who are having a moment of crisis in the face of the world that we live in to connect with another person to help them navigate that experience. Liana Douillet Guzmán
The crisis line is free and confidential, and available by text, web, and WhatsApp in both English and Spanish. Once users reach out, they are connected with a live, trained counsellor within five minutes. Liana Douillet Guzmán, FOLX Health CEO, says that having the text option lowers the barrier to entry, especially among the younger LGBTQ+ groups.
This resource will be especially important as the U.S. presidential election approaches. Mental health services often report higher rates of calls when major events occur. For example, Oklahoma crisis line services saw an increase in calls after the death of Indigenous trans high school student Nex Benedict.
FOLX mental health services have seen incredible success since they launched, which Guzmán says is a clear example of why having access to affirming and expert healthcare and mental care is connected to better outcomes. As the attacks repeatedly come from right-wing policymakers, the crisis line will act as a safe space for all LGBTQ+ people in the US.
Inaara Merani (she/her) recently completed her Masters degree at the University of Western Ontario, studying Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies with a specialization in Transitional Justice. In the upcoming years, she hopes to attend law school, focusing her career in human rights law.
Inaara is deeply passionate about dismantling patriarchal institutions to ensure women and other marginalized populations have safe and equal access to their rights. She believes in the power of knowledge and learning from others, and hopes to continue to learn from others throughout her career.