Among the 35,000 plus women gathered in Beijing and Huairou in September 1995, ten were from The Feminist Majority. Here are on-site accounts that Feminist Majority Delegation members posted on The Feminist Majority Foundation Online throughout the conference. |
September 2, 1995 - Elizabeth Spahn
Workshop - The Girl Child In Southeast Asia Speakers who work directly with girls in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka discussed the situation of girls in Southeast Asia. In Bangledesh, the child mortality rate for girls under the age of four years old is 27% higher then for little boys. In part this is due to the practice of feeding the boys first and giving them the best food. Calorie intake by girls is about 30% less than that of boys. Primary education is about equal between boys and girls, but by middle school girls are forced to drop out at more than double the rate of boys. The girls are generally forced to stay home and perform housework.
The typical day for a girl working at home begins at 5:00 a.m. when she walks to fetch water and fuel to make the family breakfeast. Her day, continues without a break, until 11:00 p.m. when she massages her father's feet before he goes to bed. The schedule is seven days per week, with no vacations. Typically she is given no praise or acknowledgement of her work.
Pakistan has developed a program to encourage rural girls' leadership. A group of girls are selected from villages and brought together for training. These girls have been taught that they are worthless and burden on their families. In the training, they are told of a person who takes care of two little boys, teaches them songs and how to count, feeds them, bathes them and takes care of them. Who is this person? The girls guess: a teacher, a nurse, a social worker? Finally one girl says: elder sister? For the first time the girls begin to see themselves as valuable, skilled, contributing to their families, and competent in their own right.
[This workship was sponsored by International Planned Parenthood Federation, which also funds these programs for girls.]
Schedule of Plenaries
Statistics on the Status of Women
Copyright 1995, The Feminist Majority Foundation and New Media Publishing Inc.
