Special Focus

AWID is an international, feminist, membership organisation committed to achieving gender equality, sustainable development and women’s human rights

AWID Forum: Co-creating Feminist Futures

In September 2016, the 13th AWID international Forum brought together in Brazil over 1800 feminists and women’s rights advocates in a spirit of resistance and resilience.

This section highlights the gains, learnings and resources that came out of our rich conversations. We invite you to explore, share and comment!


What has happened since 2016?

One of the key takeaways from the 2016 Forum was the need to broaden and deepen our cross-movement work to address rising fascisms, fundamentalisms, corporate greed and climate change.

With this in mind, we have been working with multiple allies to grow these seeds of resistance:

And through our next strategic plan and Forum process, we are committed to keep developing ideas and deepen the learnings ignited at the 2016 Forum.

What happens now?

The world is a much different place than it was a year ago, and it will continue to change.

The next AWID Forum will take place in the Asia Pacific region (exact location and dates to be announced in 2018).

We look forward to you joining us!

About the AWID Forum

AWID Forums started in 1983, in Washington DC. Since then, the event has grown to become many things to many peoples: an iterative process of sharpening our analyses, vision and actions; a watershed moment that reinvigorates participants’ feminisms and energizes their organizing; and a political home for women human rights defenders to find sanctuary and solidarity.

Learn more about previous Forums

Related Content

Может ли одна группа заполнить несколько опросов?

Нет, мы просим только один заполненный опрос от каждой группы.

Snippet FEA Unfair Policies (ES)

Escalas de justicia rosa

POLÍTICAS INJUSTAS

Selection of Forum activities

For each AWID Forum we call for contributions from a wide range of feminist and social justice movements to propose activities and create the Forum program.

For the 14th AWID international Forum, we want to make the program truly representative of the diversity of the movements.

That is why we put in place a new and engaging way to choose the proposals that will generate the final Forum program: the Participatory Selection Process (PSP).

What is the Participatory Selection Process (PSP)?

The Participatory Selection Process is the final step in reviewing the activity proposals and selecting those that will be part of the official Forum program. 

This is how it works: 

  1. Activity proposals have originally been submitted via our Call for Forum Activities, open to everyone - groups and individuals - interested in presenting their feminist reality at the Forum.
  2. Out of all the activities submitted, AWID staff pre-selects the ones best reflecting the Forum theme and presenting a creative approach for audience engagement.
  3. Activities are then reviewed and short-listed by different Forum Committees to ensure a good diversity of regions, movements and ideas.
  4. The selected proposals are then reviewed and rated by individuals and groups whose proposals have also been short-listed. The proposals which receive the most votes from fellow candidates will become part of the final Forum program.

The whole activity selection process at a glance:

Step

 

Step 1: 
Call for Forum Activities: Application submissions

Step 2:
First screening

 

Step 3:
Shortlisting 

 

Step 4:
Participatory Selection Process 

 

Timeline

December 2019 - mid.February 2020

 

January-February 2020

 

Summer 2020

 

timeline to be adjusted

 

People involved Everyone interested in co-creating the Forum program

AWID staff

 

AWID staff; Content and Methodology Committee; Access Committee

Shortlisted applicants

 

Number of activities involved

838 activities submitted

 

306 applications selected

 

126 activities selected

 

50-60 most voted activities selected for the final Forum program


Why did AWID decide to organize a PSP for the 14th AWID Forum activities?

We think a PSP is relevant for the AWID Forum because:

  • It places at the centre of the decision making process the communities who live the feminist realities that will be showcased and discussed at the Forum 

  • It is consistent with our identity and our role as a movement support/ accompaniment organization

  • It is in line with our vision of the Forum as co-created with different feminist and social justice movements, who shape the Forum through their participation in committees (content and methodology, access, artivist and host country), creating and facilitating activities as partners with AWID and also making decisions about the Program through the PSP.

  • It allows for greater diversity in the textures that will make up the Forum fabric (or in the voices that will compose the Forum song). It ensures we go beyond AWID itself and the movement partners that we already know and work with. It opens the door to the unexpected.

How did AWID come up with this PSP idea?

This is the first time AWID is considering such a process.

The initial idea came from AWID’s Co-EDs and staff. Before committing to a decision, we consulted some of the community funds that have been implementing participatory selection processes for years. These included FRIDA: The Young Feminists Fund, the International Trans Fund, UHAI - East Africa’s fund for sexual minorities and sex workers - and the Central American Women’s Fund. We consulted them to learn from their extensive experiences and get their feedback.

 


Pre-selected activities

  • Financial autonomy, breaker of silence
    ORGANISATION DES FEMMES AFRICAINES DE LA DIASPORA (OFAD) ASSOCIATION LES PETITES MERES PRODADPHE ASSOCIATION AMBE KUNKO (AAK)

  • Contribution of feminist organisations to the fight against violent extremism in Niger
    Femmes Actions et Développement (FAD)

  • Self-financing: home banking for women 
    Rassemblement des Femmes pour le développement endogène et solidaire RAFDES

  • Food and food sovereignty for rural women
    Association Song-taaba des Femmes Unies pour le Développement (ASFUD)

  • Feminist leaders, investing in positive masculinity, creating a new balanced social order: how to change mentalities? 
    Une societe cooperative, la chefferie traditionnelle des localites, les autorites administratives et les autres associations feminines ONG Centre Solidarite "Investir dans les Filles et les Femmes

  • Co-creating the sponsorship methodology.
    NEGES MAWON

  • Millennium of opportunities to save the earth (MOST) by supporting climate justice for local and Indigenous communities in Congo Basin. 
    Jeunesse Congolaise pour les Nations Unies (JCNU), Association Genre et Environnement pour le Développement (AGED)

  • Envisioning an Asian Queer Feminist Politics
    ASEAN Feminist LBQ Womxn Network Sayoni

  • Supporting the Self-Managed: Abortion Doulas, Acompanantes, and Radical Networks of support
    inroads

  • Online Feminisms: How Women Are Taking Back The Tech
    Feminism In India

  • Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Sex Workers
    Asia Pacific Network of Sex Workers (APNSW), The International Women's Rights Action Watch Asia Pacific (IWRAW AP)

  • Sustainable Feminist Leadership and Organizing - Personal and Collective Experiences
    HER Fund, Institute for Women's Empowerment (IWE) ,Kalyanamita, AAF

  • Caribbean Realities: Black Sauna Radio
    WE-Change Jamaica

  • Telephone Helplines Care and Women Experience
    Generation Initiative for Women and Youth Network (GIWYN),Youth Network for Community and Sustainable Development (YNCSD), Community Health Rights Network (CORENET)

  • Sensuality as resistance; body movement workshop
    UHAI EASHRI

  • Lesbian Disco Eastern European Style
    Sapfo Collective

  • FitcliqueAfrica Feminist Utopia Installation, Trauma Healing and Self Defense Camp
    FitcliqueAfrica (Fitclique256 Uganda Limited)

  • Queering Communications for an Open Internet
    Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice

  • Is the Way you Think about Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRHR) Ableist? Good Practices for Disability Inclusive SRHR Programmes and Advocacy.
    Asia Pacific Network of Women with Disabilities and Allies

  • Decolonizing Non-Violent Communication
    API Equality-LA, Sayoni, ASEAN Feminist LBQ Womxn Network

  • Feminist centred approaches to prosecuting sexual harassment in the world of work
    Women's Legal Centre

  • Women in Conflict in Myanmar
    Women's League of Burma, Rainfall

  • Caribbean Feminist Spaces, Creative Expressions & Spiritual Practices for Community Transformation
    CAISO: Sex and Gender Justice

  • POP-UPS: Just Power: Popular Education Tools for a Feminist Future
    JASS/Just Associates

  • UnAnonYmous: Queering Black African Diaspora Feminist Practices Sobriety

  • Digital Witchcraft: Magical Thinking for Cyberfeminist Futures
    The Digital Witchcraft Institute

  • Building Womanifestos: Grassroot Women's Agenda for Change in Asia Pacific
    Asia Pacific Forum on Women Law and Development

  • Designing your astral travels
    EuroNPUD, narcofeminists as a loose group

  • Collective Care
    RENFA Rede Nacional de Feministas Antiproibicionistas

  • Music of our movements
    Radical imagination

  • From waste to Ecofriendly coal
    KEMIT ECOLOGY SARL

  • Collective care and insurgency of feminist antiracist movements under authoritarian and violent contexts
    CFEMEA - Feminist Center of Studies and Advisory Services, CRIOLA - black women`s organization, Iniciativa Mesoamericana de Mujeres Defensoras

  • Breaking Patriarchal Religion's Stranglehold on Family Laws that Affect Our Lives #FreeOurFamilyLaws
    Musawah

  • Feminist approach to claim and control over lands within investment
    Badabon Sangho, APWLD

  • Women's Global Strike: Our resistance, our future
    Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law & Development, ESCR-Net, Women's March Global

  • Towards an Inclusive ‘Mother Earth’
    Disability Rights Fund, Open Society Foundation

  • From Inclusion to Infiltration: Strategies for Building Intersectional Feminist Movements
    Mobility International USA (MIUSA)

  • The hidden stories of women with invisible disabilities: Art in action
    The Red Door, Merchants of Madness, Improving Mental Wellbeing through Art

  • Public-Private Partnership and Women´s Human Rights: learnings from case studies in the Global South
    Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN)

  • The Interconnected Journey: Our Bodies, Our Sci-Fi! <3
    The Interconnected Journey Project, Laboratorio de Interconectividades

  • Compiling and Building: Alternative feminist vision to challenge the dominant world economic order
    IWRAW Asia Pacific

  • Self-publication as a feminist act
    International Women* Space

  • Good Practices of legal protection for gender & sexual minorities in Pakistan and their Intersectionality
    Activists Alliance Foundation, Khawja Sirah Society, Wajood Society, Wasaib Sanwaro

  • Feminist Approaches to Counter Trafficking
    IWRAW Asia Pacific, Business & Human Rights Resource Center

  • Critiquing individualism and state policies: transnational organizing against targeted violence
    Masaha: Accessible Feminist Knowledge

  • Decolonizing Intimacy: How Queer Identities Challenge Heteronormative Family Structures
    WOMANTRA

  • Yeki Hambe - Sex worker theatre
    Sex Worker Education and Advocacy Task Force

  • Creating the Indigenous feminist reality: honoring the sacred feminine and building new paths for Indigenous women
    Cultural Survival, International Funders in Indigenous Peoples

  • Eyes on Anti-prohibitionism by Brazillian Women
    Mulheres Cannabicas, Tulipas do Cerrado

  • Black Feminist Truth Commission: Addressing Injustices to Revolutionize Intersectional Feminism as the New Reality
    Black Women in Development

  • Community care is self care: true stories are told in safer spaces
    Eurasian Harm Reduction Association, Metzineres, Urban Survivor’s Union, Salvage women and children from drug abuse

  • NO MOVES BARRED:Dancing connections between Disability,trans & sexual rights against violence
    National Forum of Women with Disabilities, Autonomy foundation, Nazyk kyz

  • The Impact of Corporate Capture on Feminist Realities: Developing Tools for Action
    ESCR-Net | Economic, Social, Cultural Rights Network

  • Reimagining AIDS: building a feminist HIV response
    Frontline AIDS, Aidsfonds, IPPI (Indonesian Network of Women Living with HIV), UHAI-EASHRI (East African Sexual Health and Rights Initiative)

  • Advancing Economic Justice towards Realizing Our Vision of a Feminist Planet
    International Network for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, ESCR-Net

  • Sex Workers Cafe
    Hydra e.V.

  • Adopting an ecofeminist approach in dealing with climate change and food security
    Umphakatsi Peace Ecovillage, Human Rights Educational Centre

  • Connecting the grassroots with the international: experience from creative sex worker mobilisation in Europe
    International Committee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe, STRASS - French Sex Worker Union, APROSEX, Red Edition

  • Experiment with how innovative tech can help us feel safer when navigating our cities
    Soul City Institute for Social Justice, Safetipin, Womanity Foundation

  • question “Are hierarchies within organisations UNfeminist?”
    Gay and Lesbian Coalition of Kenya National, Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission

  • We all are different, but we do have joint shared values
    UNWUD (Ukrainian network of women who use drugs), JurFem Association, Women's Prospects

  • A World Without Class
    Bunge La Wamama Mashinani (Grassroots Women's Parliament)

  • Women Empower the Community
    Institute for Women's Empowerment (IWE), Solidaritas Perempuan, ASEC Indonesia, Komunitas Swabina Pedesaan Salassae (KSPS)

  • Feminist Organizing: Transformational Leadership - Women Workers in Latin America Creating a Feminist Labor Movement and a Feminist World of Work
    Solidarity Center

  • Acting Out, Acting Up : Disability-Feminism decolonising narratives of Stigma thro' Participatory theatre
    Rising Flame, National Indigenous Disabled Women Association, Nepal, The Spectrum & Union of Abilities, The Red Door

  • Valuing and centering rest, pleasure and play
    ATHENA Network

  • The African feminist judgment project
    The Initiative for strategic Ligation in Africa (ISLA)

  • Voices from the frontlines: Bolstering collective power to end the incarceration of women worldwide
    International Drug Policy Consortium, Equis Justicia para las Mujeres, National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls, Women and Harm Reduction International Network

  • Queer Youth Organising: imagining in an era of human rights and sustainable development
    African Queer Youth Initiative, Success Capital Organisation

  • Our Struggles Our Stories Our Strengths
    Oriang Lumalaban, Pambansang Koalisyon ng Kababaihan sa Kanayunan

  • Breaking barriers for collective Indigenous climate action in Southeast Asia
    Cuso International, Asia Indigenous Peoples' Pact

  • Love Positive Women: Going beyond romantic love to deep community love and social justice
    Eurasian Women's Network on AIDS

  • Intersex and Feminism
    Intersex Russia

  • Understanding the reproductive health experiences and needs of transgender and gender diverse people
    Asia Pacific Transgender Network (APTN)

  • Because She Cares: Critical conversations on HIV activism as (un)caring work
    Because We Care Collaborative

  • The Mississippi Food Systems Manifesto
    Center for Ideas, Equity & Transformative Change, National Council of Appropriate Technology - Gulf South, MS Food Justice Collaborative, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement

  • Kurdish Women's Movement co-presidency experience as an example of a radical feminist realization: Co-presidency is our PURPLE line!
    The Free Women’s Movement (TJA)

  • WOES -"Walking on Egg Shells"
    Eldoret Women For Development (ELWOFOD), Mama Cash, Young women against Women Custodial Injustices Network

  • FREEDOM

  • Prison Isn’t Feminist: Exploring the impact and alternatives to reliance on police and incarceration
    Migrant Sex Workers Project, Showing Up For Racial Justice

  • Bondo without Blood: A Feminist Reimagining of Sierra Leonean Rites of Passage
    Purposeful

  • Liberated Land & Territories: A Pan-African Conversation
    Thousand Currents (USA), Abahlali baseMjondolo (South Africa), Nous Sommes la Solution (west Africa/regional), Movilización de Mujeres Negras por el Cuidado de la Vida y los Territorios Ancestrales (Colombia), and Articulation of Black Rural Quilombola Communities (Brazil)

  • Popular Education and Organizing for a Feminist Economy
    Jamaica Household Workers Union (JHWU), United for a Fair Economy, Centro de Trabajadores Unidos en la Lucha (CTUL)

  • So You Wish To Mobilise With An Empty Wallet? Let’s Make It Happen!
    Breakthrough India

  • Experience sharing establishing a network for women human rights defenders in East Africa: Ugandan perspective
    Women Human Rights Defenders Network Uganda

  • Tech clinic
    Stichting Syrian Female Journalists Netowrk

  • Building Inclusive Movements: Going Beyond Tokenism
    Rising Flame

  • Justice & Healing for Survivors of GBV: an interactive debate on restorative justice and the anatomy of an apology
    One Future Collective

  • Collective actions to ending transphobia through a feminist lens
    Asia Pacific Transgender Network, Iranti, Transgender Europe

  • LBQ women & Asylum
    Sehaq

  • Abortion and Disability: Towards an Intersectional Human Rights-Based Approach
    Women Enabled International

  • Learn how to support the self-organizing of undocumented, migrant, and criminalized and sex workers communities
    Buttrerfly (Asian and Migrant Sex Workers Support Network)

  • Self Care: A Fundamental Tool for Sustaining LGBTQI & Feminist Organizing
    United and Strong Inc., S.H.E Barbados, Lez Connect

  • Reclaiming Young African Feminist VOICES-REALITIES-POWER for climate justice
    Young Feminist organization Gasy Youth Up, Young African Feminist Dialogues

  • Women in action & solidarity: performing our realities (Asia & Africa)
    Young Feminist organization Gasy Youth Up ( co-founder) , Young African Feminist Dialogues ( member)

  • Women in action & solidarity: performing our realities (Asia & Africa)
    Women Performing the World (Asia/Africa)

  • Challenging patriarchy: Workers in entertainment sector
    Women Forum for Women in Nepal (WOFOWON)

  • The non-citizens: issues of women's citizenship in the context of migrant, vulnerable communities in South Asia
    NEthing

  • Visioning for voice in migration and climate crises
    Women's Refugee Commission, The Feminist Humanitarian Network, ActionAid

  • In It Together: Women's Funds and Feminist Movements Co-Creating Feminist Realities
    Mama Cash, Global Fund for Women, Urgent Action Fund - Africa

  • Co-creating magic with young feminist movements - participatory practices that spark joy
    Feminist organizing, FRIDA The Young Feminist Fund (Community), Teia

  • Protection right of woman’s in difficult realities 3 organizations of women from marginally communities
    NGO Asteria, Ermolaeva Irena and Bayazitova Renata. NGO Ganesha Musagalieva Tatiana. NGO Ravniy Ravnomu Kucheryavyh Tanya

  • Feminnale - traditions against art and expression
    Bishkek Feminist Initiatives

  • Resistance through knowledge, arts and activism: creation of a feminist library in Armenia
    FemHouse, Armenia

  • Conquering the UN System with Feminist Strategies (You Don’t Need to be a Lawyer to Have Fun)
    Kazakhstan Feminist Initiative "Feminita", IWRAW Asia Pacific, ILGA World

  • Data. Huh. What is it good for? Feminist data and organizing for feminist outcomes
    International Women's Development Agency, Women's Rights Action Movement, Fiji Women's Rights Movement

  • Criminalized Women’s voice, leadership and influence on laws, policies and practices in Kenya
    Keeping Alive Societies Hope-KASH, Katindi Lawyers and Advocates, Vocal Kenya

  • From Colombia to the world, African women's changing force
    Proceso de Comunidades Negras en Colombia -PCN, Solidarité Féminine por la Paix el le Develppment Integral -SOFEPADI,

  • Afro Queer Listening Lounge and Story-Telling Booth
    AQ Studios, None on Record, AfroQueer Podcast

  • Reclaiming Bodily Integrity
    GBV Prevention Network : Coordinated by Raising Voices

  • Learning from diversity
    Circulo de Mujeres con Discapacidad -CIMUDIS, Alianza Discapacidad por nuestros Derechos -ADIDE, Fundación Dominicana de Ciegos -FUDCI, Filial Puerto Rico de Mujeres con Discapacidad

  • Football as a feminist tool
    Fundación GOLEES (Género, Orgullo, Libertad y Empoderamiento de Ellas en la Sociedad)

  • Migratory constellations
    LasVanders

  • Ecofeminist dialogues to defend territories
    CIEDUR (Centro Interdisciplinario de Estudios sobre el Desarrollo), Equit, Foro permanente de Manaos y Amazonia

  • La Frida BikesMoviment
    La Frida Bike

  • Witchcraft, shamanism and other insurgent knowledge against patriarchy.
    Colectiva Feminista MAPAS-Mujeres Andando Proceso por Autonomías Sororales

  • Experiences, learnings and challenges in managing holistic security of horizontal feminist organisations and of gender-dissidence in times of social and political crisis. The experience of the popular uprising in Chile of 18 October.
    Fudación Comunidades en Interfaz

  • Food that we all know about
    Las Nietas de Nonó, Parceleras Afrocaribeñas por la Transformación barrial (PATBA)

  • Practices of resistance against climate change of Indigenous women in Peru and Guatemala
    Thousand Currents, Red de Mujeres Productoras de la Agricultura Familiar, Asociación de Mujeres Ixpiyakok (ADEMI, Ixpiyakok Women's Association)

  • Building Feminist Cities
    CISCSA, Articulacion Feminista Marcosur

  • Stand in my place
    Alianza Discapacidad por nuestros Derechos - ADIDE, Circulo de Mujeres con Discapacidad -CIMUDIS

  • Clearing the way for women's fullness of life, healing collective and historical traumas
    Grupo de Mujeres Mayas Kaqla

  • Zapoteca Indigenous women challenged by nature

  • Houses of Care and Healing for Women Human Rights Defenders as part of Integral Feminist Protection: A Feminist Reality
    Iniciativa Mesoamericana De Defensoras de Derechos Humanos, Consorcio Oaxaca para el Diálogo Parlamentario y la Equidad A.C, Red Nacional De Defensoras De Derechos Humanos en Honduras, Coletivo Feminista de Autocuidado

  • Healing your unicornix voice: Weaving ancient and digital technologies to sharpen the tongue

  • Feminist trajectories for an assisted motherhood protocol for women with disabilities
    Circulo emancipador de mujeres y niñas con discapacidad de Chile, CIMUNIDIS, WEI

  • School for trans feminist children
    Fundación Selena

  • REDTRASEX: Experience of Organization and Struggle for the Rights of Women Sex Workers in Latin America and the Caribbean
    RedTraSex Red de mujeres trabajadoras sexuales LAC

  • Gender based violence and the world of sex work in Mexico
    Brigada Callejera de Apoyo a la Mujer, "Elisa Martínez", A.C., Red Mexicana de Organizaciones Contra la Criminalización del VIH. Red Mexicana de Trabajo Sexual

  • Migration forces us to draw the path as we walk
    Asociación de Trabajadoras del Hogar a Domicilio y de Maquila. ATRAHDOM

  • New narratives for Black women: body, healing and pleasure

  • Weaving memories and networks - Black Feminists strengthening Black feminisms in LAC
    Red de Mujeres Afrolatinoamericanas, Afrocaribeñas y de la Diáspora, Articulação de Organizações de Mulheres Negras Brasileiras (AMNB), Voces Caribeñas

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Snippet FEA Sopo Japaridze (FR)

Nous avons le plaisir de vous présenter Sopo Japaridze, féministe féroce, dirigeante syndicale et présidente du syndicat de service indépendant Réseau de Solidarité.

Elle a quitté le pays très jeune pour les États-Unis, où elle est devenue politiquement active en tant qu'organisatrice syndicale. Elle a toujours gardé la Géorgie à l'esprit pendant tout ce temps, jusqu'au jour où, 20 ans plus tard, elle a décidé de revenir.

La confédération syndicale géorgienne existante à cette époque était loin d'être idéale. C’est pourquoi, armée de ses compétences, de ses connaissances et de son expérience en matière de syndicalisation, Sopo est retournée en Géorgie et a formé son propre syndicat.

Elle est aussi une chercheuse passionnée et une écrivaine. Elle étudie les relations de travail et les relations sociales, écrit pour diverses publications et est co-éditrice de Left East, une plate-forme analytique d'Europe de l'Est. Elle a également cofondé l'initiative et le podcast d'histoire politique, Réimaginer la Géorgie Soviétique, où elle explore les complexités et les nuances des expériences du pays sous l'Union soviétique, pour mieux comprendre son passé et construire un avenir meilleur.

Kunyit Asam: The Roots of Love and Resilience

By Prinka Saraswati, Gianyar, Bali

The menstrual cycle usually lasts between 27 and 30 days. During this time, the period itself would only go on for five to seven days. During the period, fatigue, mood swings, and cramps are the result of inflammation.

In traditional Javanese culture, this is the moment for women to rest and take care of themselves. During this moment, a woman would take Kunyit Asam, a jamu or herbal drink to soothe the inflammation. This elixir consists of turmeric and tamarind boiled together in a pot.

I still remember my first period - it was one day before graduation day in elementary school. I remember pedaling my bike feeling something warm running between my thighs. When I arrived home I did all I could to clean myself and then put on a menstrual pad. My mother came home from work about four hours later. I told her what had happened. She looked me in the eye and asked how I felt. I told her that it was painful, that my body was swollen in every place. Then she asked me to go with her to the backyard. I followed her to our little jungle, my mother sat down on the soil and smiled.

“See this slender leaf? This is the leaf of Kunyit, *empon-empon that leaves the yellow stain on your fingers. What’s most important is not the leaf, but the roots. You dig the soil and slowly grab the roots.”, my mother showed me how to pick Kunyit or Turmeric roots. Then we went to the kitchen where she boiled water along with some tamarind. While waiting for it to boil, she showed me how to wash and grate the orangey-yellow root. Then, we put the grated turmeric into the boiling tamarind water. “Tomorrow, you can make it for yourself. This will help you to feel better!”.

I remember the first time I tasted it - a slightly bitter taste but also sour. My mother always served it warm. She would also put some in a big bottle which I would place on my stomach or lower back for further relief. For days after, my mother’s hands and mine were yellow. My friends could always tell every time I got period because my hands would be yellow.

A year after my first period, I found out that you could get the bottled version in convenience stores. Still, I made my own Kunyit Asam every time I had my period because the one in the convenience stores was cold. It did not smell of wet soil and warm kitchen.

Fast forward, I am a 26 year old woman who casually makes this drink for friends when they have their periods. I’ve made some for my housemates and I’ve delivered some for friends who live in different towns. I do not grow turmeric roots in my garden, but I have grown and shared the love from my mom. What was once from garden to cup is now from *pasar to cup.

A couple of days ago, I asked my mother who taught her how to make the jamu.

“Who else? Yang Ti*! Your grandmother was not just a teacher”, said my mom. I was never close to my grandmother. She passed away when I was eight. All I knew from my mom was that she was a math teacher who had to teach courses after work. I had this image of my grandmother as a hard worker who was kind of distant with her children. My mom did not disagree with that but explained it came from her survival instinct as a mother. “She tried to make time. She tried. She taught me how to make jamu so I could take care of myself and my sisters”.

My mother is the second child out of seven, six of whom are girls. The reason my grandmother taught her is so that all of her children could take care of each other. While my mother was taught how to make the drink, my mother’s older sister was taught how to plant turmeric. Yang Ti knew which one loved the smell of soil more and which one loved the smell of the kitchen. My mother was the latter. She learned how to plant from my aunt, her older sister.

My grandfather worked in a bank but he got laid off when he was in his 40s. So, my grandmother had to do a side-hustle to support their children. My mother was in high school at that time when Yang Ti woke her and her older sister up at dawn. “Would you help me to pick some roots?”. Of course nobody said no. Especially if it was your mother, especially if you were born in Javanese culture where saying “no” sounded like a bad word. Together, the three of them went to the backyard, and they harvested empon - empon, rhizome, that was buried inside the soil. She grew many kinds of rhizome; temu lawak, temu putih, ginger, galangal, kunci, kencur, and kunyit. That was the day where my mother realized that her mother was never far away from her.

That was the day where she could spend more time with her mother. There, in the garden. There, in the kitchen.

“We’re sending these for Ibu Darti, the lady who lives across the river. Kunyit Asam for her and her daughters.”, said my grandmother to my mother and my aunt that day. They poured the Turmeric-Tamarind warm drink into a tall thermos and later my grandmother would deliver it on the way to school.

Over time, my grandmother got more orders for jamu. Everybody in the family helped her to make and deliver her jamu. The small business lasted only a few years, but that was what paid for my mother and her siblings’ education.

Today, my mother, who got laid off just a few days before I wrote this piece, harvested Turmeric and other roots. She’s making her Turmeric Tamarind drink from her kitchen.

My phone rang in the middle of this afternoon, a couple minutes after I boiled the rest of my grated turmeric. Today is one day after my period.

“Ingka, have you washed your pot after boiling those turmeric? It would forever be yellow if you don’t wash it right away!”


  • *empon-empon = roots like ginger, turmeric, etc. coming from the Javanese word “Empu” which means, something or someone that has deep knowledge.

  • *jamu = Indonesia’s traditional elixir made of roots, barks, flowers, seeds, leaves, and fruits.

  • *Yang Ti = Javanese term for grandmother, taken from the term “Eyang Putri” the female you look up to.

  • *pasar = the word for traditional market in Indonesian.

 


“Feminist Movement”

by Karina Tungari, Hamburg, Germany  (@_katung_)

The more women support other women, the quicker we’ll see progress. Together we are stronger and make even more impact.

Karina Tungari, Hamburg, Germany  (@_katung_)


 

Reason to join 4

Voyez grand ! Notre rayonnement international nous permet de combiner notre travail analytique avec des outils politiques et pratiques de plaidoyer et de transformation afin de faire avancer la cause des mouvements féministes à tous les niveaux.

كم سؤال في الاستطلاع؟

هنالك 47 سؤال في الاستطلاع، منها 27 سؤال اجباري* وال- 20 الباقون هم أسئلة اختيارية. أغلب الأسئلة هي أسئلة متعددة الخيارات. ندعوكم/ن للإجابة على جميع الأسئلة.

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Body

Snippet FEA Union Otras (EN)

UNION OTRAS

The Sex Workers' Trade Union Organisation (Organización de Trabajo Sexual, OTRAS) is the first union of sex workers in the history of Spain. It was born out of the need to ensure social, legal and political rights for sex workers in a country where far-right movements are on the rise.

After years of struggles against the Spanish legal system and anti-sex workers groups who petitioned to shut it down, OTRAS finally obtained its legal status as a union in 2021.

Its goal? To decriminalize sex work and to ensure decent working conditions and environments for all sex workers.

The union represents over 600 professional sex workers, many of whom are migrant, trans, queer and gender-diverse.

Pleasure Garden Exhibition

The artwork is a photography and illustration collaboration between Siphumeze and Katia during lockdown. The work looks at black queer sex and plesure narratives, bondage, safe sex, toys, mental health and sex and many more. It was created to accompany the Anthology Touch.

Mental Health
Mental Health
Sex and Spirtuality
Sex and Spirtuality
Orgasm
Orgasm

About the Artists:

Siphumeze Khundayi portrait
Siphumeze Khundayi is an art-maker, photographer and facilitator interested in creative ways of bringing together dialogue and artistic practice in relation to African Queer identity.

She is creative director of HOLAAfrica! a pan-Africanist womanist online collective.

Her solo and collaborative performance work has been featured in a number of festivals and theatre spaces such as Ricca Ricca Festival in Japan

She directed two Naledi nominated productions in 2017 and 2018. She directed a show that won a Standard Bank Ovation award in 2020.

As a photographer she was part of a group exhibition titled Flowers of my Soul in Italy organised by the Misfit Project. Produced three publications for HOLAAfrica and was published in and provided the cover for volume two: As You Like of the Gerald Kraak Anthologies.
katia portrait
Katia Herrera is a 21-year-old  Digital visual artist from the noisy city of  Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic. Despite Herrera being a self-proclaimed introvert, her artwork is remarkably loud in a world trying to quiet black voices. With titles like Black Woman, You Own the Moon, Earth Goddess, Forever,  and Universe Protector, Herrera’s legacy will be marked by her passion for highlighting the endurance and perseverance of black folks of old and present to contrast the narrative that black skin should only be associated with slavery.

One of her most lovely and vivaciously titled works, Universe Protector, portrays the black soul as a divine entity full of strength, power, and greatness. In her youth, her love of graphic design was stimulated by her parents’ artistry and the Photoshop they had downloaded on their computer for their professional photography.

Our values - bodily autonomy

Bodily autonomy, integrity and freedoms<

We celebrate everyone's right to choose their identities, relationships, goals, work, dreams and pleasures, and what they do with their mind, body and spirit. We believe in working towards access to resources, information and safe and enabling environments that allow this to happen.

Как вы будете представлять и обрабатывать данные, собранные в ходе опроса?

Данные будут обработаны в статистических целях, чтобы осветить состояние ресурсного обеспечения феминистских движений во всем мире, и представлены будут только в обобщенном виде. AWID не будет публиковать информацию о конкретных организациях или отображать информацию, которая позволила бы идентифицировать организации по их местоположению или характеристикам, без их согласия.