The Women's Liberation Movement in Mauritius
published by and available from Muvman Liberasyon Fam, Celicourt Street (Lakaz Ros), Forest-Side, Mauritius.
A rare book. A book born from the very inside of the struggle of the masses of women in the Indian Ocean Islands of Mauritius; a book born out of continual fecundation by the vast debates of modern political philosophy. A child of love, of feminism and of class struggle. A book about the will to change the world. A book to reject obscurantism, old and new. The 'Women's Liberation Movement in Mauritius' gives wide angle shots of the women's struggle in Mauritius over the past twelve years, and then zooms in to tiny details like pairs of sponge flip-flops on the doorstep outside an all night women's festival; it introduces what the 'Women's Liberation Movement' is, what it does and how it works; it also shows what it is not, contrasting this movement with other major tendencies in the struggle for socialism. The book is like the muses telling us. (From back cover.)
AIDS: Let us Fight it Together
published by Women's Action Group, P.O. Box 135, Harare, Zimbabwe, available at $1.50per copy.
In July, WAG published "AIDS: Let Us Fight It Together". The book was sent to all SPEAK OUT readers. So many other people wrote to ask for a copy of the book that it was soon finished. Many requests for the book are still coming to WAG.
So WAG decided to print the book again. The Second (Revised) Edition has been changed a little after getting opinions from many prople — urban and rural, doctors and nurses, teachers, ordinary people, both men and women.
We all have many questions about AIDS. And we all have the right to good information, whether we are rich or poor, educated or not, black or white, men or women. Often the information we get is in difficult and frightening medical language, or it has nothing to do with our situation here in Zimbabwe. Often too, it is only in English.
The WAG book on AIDS uses ordinary language. It answers many questions asked by Zimbabweans of different cultural groups, all ages, rural and urban, women and men. You can get the AIDS book in Shona with English translations, or in Ndebele with English translations. The book is in cartoon style, with several main characters who discuss AIDS outside a clinic in a rural community. But the information is useful for town people as well. Everyone can benefit from reading "AIDS: Let Us Fight It Together".
Some of the questions answered in the book include: Is AIDS really a serious problem, or is it just government trying to stop us having a free sex life? Does AIDS really spread easily from one person to another? How can I tell if a person has AIDS before I sleep wth them? How can I tell my partner to use a condom when we are married and we are supposed to have children? Is it true that children can get AIDS?
It is important that we all learn the facts about AIDS. Everyone has a choice to be responsible and careful in our sexual behaviour, to avoid getting AIDS and spreading it to other people.
Some organisations working on AIDS education in other countries in Africa have written to WAG saying they would like to use this Zimbabwean AIDS book in their countries, and translate it into their own languages. WAG will be pleased if the book can contribute to AIDS education in other countries as well as in Zimbabwe.
Women Farmers and Rural Change in Asia: Towards Equal Access and Participation
edited by Noeleen Heyzer, published by Asian Pacific Development Centre, Pesiaran Duta, P.O. Box 12224, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
In this book the Asian and Pacific Development Centre, Kuala Lumpur, presents the findings of an extensive oneyear research project on women. Countries covered include China, India, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, the Philippines and Thailand. Eight institutions from these countries provide a picture of the effects of rapid change on women farmers. Each writer or group of writers takes up the theme in a particular country with its own problems and perspectives. Although the countries are very different many common issues of concern to rural women do emerge.
Noeleen Heyzer, who edited the book, draws the threads together in her overview. The final dialogue between APDC and ACWF (All China Women's Federation) summarizes the findings. Practical strategies to improve projects form p£u-t of the recommendations. These strategies aim to help rural women to greater independence and a better standard of living.
Pinpointing the problems
In his foreword, Maj Shahari, director of APDC speaks strongly on the need for reappraisal of large projects:
"If progress is to be made in reducing 'hardcore' poverty, large- scale development projects must be designed to reach the poorest strata of rural women, besides men. In other words in the formulation and implementation of rural development programs, the active concern for women's situation should become part of a routine process."
Heyzer identifies two unhelpful assumptions that have been made pretty generally: that development which benefits men automatically benefits women, and that development that benefits one stratum of rural society will automatically benefit the rest. She also points to three major issues affecting women:
- changes in the employment patterns and work load of women farmers;
- changes in women's access to and control of water;
- differential access of men and women to new resources, for example, technology, new skills, credit, new knowledge, newly credited organisations and channels of decision making.
She sees this as the greatest obstacle to the future equitable participation of women in production.
"Women hold half of the sky"
India and China together have approximately one-third of the world's female population. In China, rural change has been comprehensive. Millions of housewives have stepped out of their homes to work in farms and factories. But Govind Kellkar's research leads to the conclusion that despite strong government policy and a social revolution, the traditional hierarchical structures of patriarchy still survive.
India has introduced some land reforms, co-operative farming and community development. But the inequalities for women remain: 'Are we not peasants?' says one Indian woman. 'Why, when the land is offered for homesteads, is it not given to us?' Women often struggle against men in the community. Rural women's organisations still emphasise housewifery, ignoring women's contribution to agriculture, cattle-raising and fishing.
Malaysia: Resettlement—who gains?
The writers here distinguished four major traditional agricultural systems: communal, small peasant farmers, small landholding settlement, and modern plantations. In spite of women's involvement in all four systems, women are under- represented in formal organisations —sometimes a few older women may be members of these groups.
The case study the writers gave is a three-village resettlement. Land tenure changed as compensation money was not used to purchase new land: 'There is no land for our children, unlike the old place where land can be shared equally,' said one woman. A second major change was to cash cropping with employed labour. 'Money is everything now...Everything and everywhere we go, we need money,' said another. Men benefited but women were marginalised by the changes.
Sarawak: Urbanising rural life?
Hew Cheng Sim and Flora Kedit studied resettlement in three villages of people from five community areas flooded by the Batang Ai Dam, and the effect on rural Iban women who include 30% of the breadwinners in the villages. The people generally, and especially women, were not directly involved in the planning or decision-making for the resettlement. As in the Malaysian study, lack of land, introduction to a cash-oriented lifestyle and changes from food production to cash cropping have disadvantaged Iban women. Formerly, far from being dependent on men, Iban women had been the mainstay in farming and ritual activities. Now, though up to 58% of the employees on the large estates are women, they have little voice in organisations.
Many of the resettled women feel humiliated at having to work on 'other people's forest'. One woman commented: 'We now have to spend money on petrol to drive far away to collect firewood from other people's forest when last time we were near enough to just walk.'
The new system of plantation agriculture has eroded women's traditional equality with men; formalised channels of communication mean that women have less say in their village longhouses, and less than one-fifth of the compensation saved or invested belonged to the women.
Sri Lanka: Changing the river, changing the patterns of life
Irrigation schemes have changed agricultural patterns for peoples of the Mahaweli River. Chena or slash-and-burn farming was practised on the highlands, while paddy supplemented this in the river valley. The abundance of land for shifting agriculture gave women an important place in production. In the river resettlement scheme chena is not allowed and agriculture has become settled. Women have few land rights, cannot obtain loans, and have no access to agricultural extension or marketing within the scheme. 'Within the scheme I have hardly any means of earning an income for myself, whereas earlier if I needed cash I could sell some of the millet from the chena which I planted and harvested...'
'Nobody in the project comes to see my plot or advises me on how to grow better maize.'
The Philippines: Women, men and farm technology
In a comparative study of two central Luzon villages Cynthia Banzon-Bautista and Nanette G. Dungo conclude that mechanisation and changes in farm practice have displaced women more than men. Women are relegated to collecting and processing left-over grains —the rural counterpart of scavenging.
While women in the two villages shared in decision-making and were money managers they also had to make ends meet for the survival of the households. Aling Charing, wife of the landless rural worker told the interviewers: 'The problem of economic survival falls more on me than on my husband.' Women are overburdened with tasks marginally connected to agriculture which contribute to the household and village economy although this contribution is seldom recognised.
Thailand: Water, transport and the work of women
People from old Chan Thuk who had resettled, largely by their own efforts, in three villages after the inundation of their valley, were interviewed about changing work patterns. Two-thirds agreed that women had to work harder than men, while most saw women as facing more problems in family survival than men.
Most agreed with the old Thai proverb that 'Men are the forelegs of the elephant and women are the hind legs.' Social class and income are important in determining work patterns. In poor families men and women work together, often doing the same work in the fields. Men may take care of the children if the woman manages to find paid work. Usually well-off women were the ones who joined organisations, though there were some non-political, informal groups of poor women.
This is an exciting and challenging book and its research is based on the experience of grassroots people. One final quote to whet your appetite: 'Nothing gets the attention of state and policy makers better than the determination of an organised struggle or movement...so there is a need to continue the momentum for women's liberation and not to be complacent with some gains.'
Source: International Women's Development Agency, Report to associates and friends, June 1988, P.O. Box 372 Abbotsford Vic. 3067, Australia
From Bonding Wires to Bonding Women: Proceedings of the International Consultation on Micro-Chip Technology, Manila, Philippines
by the Organizing committee: the Participatory Research Group, Kilusan ng Manggagawang Kababaihan-KMK (Women's Worker Movement), Center for Women's Resources, (CWR) Manila, Women's Center, Manila and the Women's Pro-am of the International Council for Adult Education. Available from Participatory Research Group, 394 Euclid Ave., Suite 308, Toronto, Ontario M6G 2S9, Canada and Center for Women's Resources, 43 Roces Avenue, Quezon City, Philippines. Price US$5.00
This book includes testimonies of women workers and activists from factories in Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines, and offices in Canada and the US, as well as analyses of the global context, local strategies for fighting back and regional and international networking.
In it, women from different points along the global assembly line share experiences. Their stories bring out the commonalities in the experiences and struggles of women workers in different regions of the world. The booklet is intended to serve as a tool for organizers and popular educators to further understand the struggles of women in the global assembly line. It will also help to build links and solidarity among women around the world.
Looking Beyond the Frame: Racism, Representation and Resistance
edited by M. Reeves and J. Hammond, published by and available from Links Publications, 232 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 lUH, U.K
We live in a world where images are all-pervasive, yet the power of those who take the pictures is rarely questioned. From the 19th century, photography has been used to capture and classify Black people. Yet photographs are neither natural nor neutral, but are constructions of 'reality* as defined by those who take them. The representation of Black and Third World people is rooted in a history of colonial domination and development of racist ideologies. Today, we are bombarded with images which are a legacy of these ideas—stereotypes which emphasise the 'passive', the 'violent' and the 'exotic'. These images, often in the context of famine or 'disasters', have been widely used for fund-raising by development agencies, who have played a key role in shaping the perceptions of Third World people. We need to look 'beyond the frame'.
This book explores the relationship between power and Black representation in a range of articles on the use of images by Development Charities, the Eritrean struggle, racism and education in Britain and Black sexuality. It shows also how Black photographers and film-makers are redressing the balance in new kinds of image-making. (From back cover.)