More from the Young Women of Swaziland

Nearly two weeks since the closing of this years Southern African Young Women's Festival, and the spirit of change is still in the air.

Check out one of the sisters blog's about religion, leadership and governance; keep the flames burning.

http://dfeminismspot.blogspot.com/2012/10/how-far-with-religion_30.html?spref=fb

Like a match to a flame, the Southern African Young Women’s Festival 2012 is ablaze!

^{Interspersed with poetry, singing, dancing, debate and energy, The Southern African Young Women’s Festival 2012 is definitely  burning and I am definitely on Fire!}

^{My flame sparked on day 1 when historical perspectives of feminism were shared and feminist theories were explored leading us to the realization and appreciation that despite the fact that African women’s struggles and experiences of oppression are different, the quest for recognition of their autonomy and freedom including identity, bodily integrity, and autonomy is universal and this can be seen in women’s continued active resistance to various forms of injustice, tyranny, oppression, inequality and discrimination.}

^{Then my flame was ignited by the call for young feminist women like myself to begin practicing feminism in their daily lives…..as in to walk the talk…and this particularly made me aware that often times I have failed to challenge and question oppressive forces that place me under pressure, limit my possibilities, make me unhappy and take away my freedom.}

^{It has dawned upon me that by not questioning and confronting these forces and systems, I am actually entertaining patriarchy and playing a role in upholding the repressive and cruel ideals of the institution of patriarchy. And so  I choose not to conform to patriarchal rules and oppressions in my daily life, coz guess what, this girl is on FIRE!}

^{Ooooooh and Pajama Party night was an uncontrollable blaze. Blazing with ideas around the significance of female sexuality and the political tinge of African Women’s sexualities, the pajama party was not only fun but extremely thought provoking for me!  All dressed in cute pajama garments and rocked by the different meanings of sexual pleasure, no one present at pajama night can possibly ignore that woman’s experiences of sexual pleasure vary, and that the experiences of this pleasures take assorted forms.} 

^{And then my fire further ignited into an inferno during a thrilling and intriguing debate around the motion: ‘Culture has placed women’s rights in jeopardy.” And it puzzled me to hear some of my feminist sisters arguing that culture does not jeopardize women’s rights saying that culture is a way of life that promotes peace and well being for all, and that culture has often been manipulated by political players and other forces to inhibit the rights of woman so as to benefit them. But I am definitely not going to give a blind eye to the significant role that culture plays in proliferating the violations of women’s human rights.}

^{So the fire got fierce and fiery during Cow Girl Night on day 2 ! With all sisters claded into cowgirl outfits and celebrating and dancing to our feminism and “sisterly-hoodness” (yes this word exists in my dictionary ;)! And an intergenerational dialogue in this space got me realizing that women in the older women’s movement have a significant role in cultivating young women’s leadership skills and strengthening their meaningful input and participation in developmental processes, policy formulation, analysis and decision making!} 

^{It came to my realization that there is some magic in mentoring of young women through inter-generational dialogues, sharing of information, skills, strategies and experiences and that our ‘older’ feminist sisters and mothers are there for us but we need to utilize our opportunities with them wisely and work hand in hand with them in finding spaces within the women’s movement.}

^{And so today we continue with the festival and I cant wait to see how fierce this fire is going get!}

^{Sister Sister! ……I salute you all}

Day 2 "Breaking the Barriers"

The day began with an interesting and engaging conversation about political consciousness. We examined the ways in which we arrive at our political identities and then how these identities shape our consciousness.

Hakima Abbas led a discussion about her personal journey of political consciousness. We touched on Black Consciousness, Feminism, Socialist theory as some of the political ideologies that shape our lives. We spoke about some of the weaknesses in these movements but the opportunity to extract from them that which forwards our causes. The conversation was framed by the recognition that we all partake in various forms of ideologies and understanding how they shape our identities is fundamental in determining our strategies.

The program moved onto a discussion about body politics, examining the ways in which our bodies are policed, politicised and silenced and the strategies we employ in resisting this control.We watched a performance by Staceyann Chin, entitled "All Oppression is Connected".

The afternoon ended with a debate on culture: "Has culture jeopardised women's right?" After an impassioned motion and fierce rebuttal about the fundamental meanings of culture, tradition and practice, no clear resolution was drawn. The twitter hashtag #SAYWF was blazing away with provocative questions requiring us to look deeper into our own agency in defining cultural practices.

Looking forward to day 3 "Creativity as Expression" and chance to see more of Swaziland!

Mazuba Haanyama

Your body is the temple of God

Your body is the temple of God

Engaging on body politics with young women during a session at SAYWF raised an interesting issue around the body. Whilst women spoke of how political the way their hair is, how their dress is controlled and restricted by police and society in their different contexts the issue of religion surfaced.

"You can say all you want to say about these bodies but the first thing I was told as a young girl was that my body is the temple of God. That statement has followed me through my entire life."  A discussion followed on this issue as young women traced the impact of this message on their lives. Part of guarding the temple has been to stay chaste, to dress conservatively and be pure in various ways as determined by family and the church. Religion is a part of many young women's lives but there is no disputing the complexities related to it and the kind of contradictions it generates in young women's lives and that it is difficult to find space to engage with the contradictions.

A young woman speaking about her experience of rape reinforced the trauma of being in a space where she had been told that her entire worth was on her body, its purity and chastity and how all of a sudden she felt worthless because some bastard had violated her. 

Rudo Chigudu

Challenging Oppressive Systems Day 1!

The Festival #SAYWF has finally begun. It is day 1 and we are getting into the nitty gritty of the reason we are here. Voices of revolution are in the air and debate has been sparked.The day has started with an interrogation of what feminism is. This is an age-old question that we return to as feminists again and again and that we get asked about, often. What kinds of feminisms work for us and how? What is the history of feminist theory? How has that history been documented in Africa?

Lots of energy in the room and a lot of questions. Check out some of the probing questions posed today:

- If we are here to disrupt oppressive systems then should we not be revolting against capitalism?

- What is the place of African Feminism in our lives as African women?

- How do we think about class struggles in fight for better lives for women?

- How do we build solidarity amongst our differences?

- Trans feminism is growing on the continent, how do we integrate, deconstruct, evolve our feminism such that they are more inclusive and radical?

More to come about the Festival - Watch the space!

A New Revolution. The Women Triumph!

My name is Quitéria Guirengane, I am a young Mozambican women and rights activist. I currently work for the Youth Parliament of Mozambique, a non-partisan social movement, in the capacity of a Program Officer. I have been affiliated to this movement since 2008.

My dream is to build a new society where people, men and women, are aware of their role in promoting democracy and good governance through political participation – and where this participation does not simply translate into affiliation to a political party but into demanding their rights, adhering to their responsibilities, accessing opportunities and having social respect. 

My struggle has been to persuade women to join this new women revolution and to transform the youth in a power in my country.

As part of the Youth Parliament I have been facing a lot of challenges, mostly because the political system is not yet prepared to engage different approaches and perspectives, such as freedom of expression, gender equity and non-partisan activism. In my society, women are expected to be in private spaces because, despite the high levels of cosmetic women political participation, the society still believes that political engagement is reserved for men.

That is why we, all the young Southern African women leaders, still have a steep mountain to climb in this great struggle for gender equity, in a context where women believe that they don’t have the same rights as men, and where men see women activism as a deviant behavior dangerous to their community values.

In recent years, I participated in several national and international conferences that allowed me to share experiences, build wide networks and get a new perspective on youth and women affairs. Among which were, by way of illustration, the Africamp in Kenya, the Lusophone Human Rights Camp in Angola both organized by OSISA, the Young African Leaders Forum with President Obama in United States of America and the Young African Women Forum with Michelle Obama in South Africa both organized by US Government, the Stockholm Internet Forum on Internet Freedom for Global Development in Sweden organized the Swedish Government and, the SADC Civil Society Conference recently. These moments were extremely important to learn that there are many other Young Leaders around the world deeply engaged in the struggle for the same principles and values as mine: building a democratic and vibrant generation.

On the other hand, the Youth Parliament of Mozambique is coordinating, in partnership with regional youth platforms across the continent, the organization of the African Youth Conference on Democracy and Good Governance in Mozambique next December, a conference that will join 200 young African leaders. So this will be a great opportunity to share experience and amplify voices regarding this event.

Accordingly, I expect that the Southern African Young Women Festival will bring a 'synergetic' effect, spreading our voices in Southern Africa in order to create a New Revolution, the Women Triumph! 

Sharing experiences we will charge our batteries with new energy to vibrantly mobilize, motivate and engage a huge number of young women and men in our countries decided to make the change happen today!

 Quitéria Guirengane

My Expectations of the Festival-Voice from Lesotho

Women trafficking has taken its course recently around the world. In our country, Lesotho, we usually conduct research on the extent and impact of human trafficking. At this festival I am expecting to learn more about human trafficking. I believe it’s high time we research more and find possible ways to prevent and overcome this problem. Hopefully, this festival will help us improve strategies to overcome this problem.

Some women do not know their rights even now. We host radio and television programmes to inform the public about legal issues that affect them. Again, we provide information to the public through legal documents, public gathering and training workshops, but these does not seem to be enough. I hope that after the festival I will be equipped with new strategies to deal with these issues.

We provide training to the community in the form of disseminating  information and we train different people and organizations on different aspects of the law. In this regard I am expecting to gain more knowledge on the new ways to pass it on to more people.

Again, my expectations are very high. I  hope to gain more knowledge on how to reach to the rural people, because some of them do not even have radios and televisions. I am hoping to gain improved strategies in lobbying that we can use to communicate with people in the rural areas. Sometimes they believe the message is not meant for them because they are not educated.

Malekeba Ntholeng