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Dr. Fouzia Saeed spoke at two events in Minnesota |
Slavery is an issue that American public dealt with in the past. It still is being experienced in the form of social discrimination in some parts of the USA. There are communities who are yet struggling with the shackles of slavery in many parts of the world. Pakistan is one, where a social movement is trying to meet this challenge. There are families--men, women and children--that are kept as slaves for farm labor, suffering an extreme form of human rights violation. Women suffer the most, as it is not only physical labor, restrictions on mobility, and debilitating hunger-- but they also are forced to experience humiliation and brutal sexual abuse. Dr. Saeed will speak about the suffering of women in bondage and challenges they face, with the goal to free them in this time and age of modernization. A poignant documentary, "Marwa's Story", will be shown of one such woman who had the courage to confront to the humiliation.
Tuesday, October 9th, 2007
| Women's Movement in Pakistan: |
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Being organized by Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights & Briggs and Morgan, PA as a part of their Women's Human Rights Speaker Series. For details check http://www.mnadvocates.org/Women_s_Program.html
Efforts to improve women’s conditions on the Asian sub-continent started well before the partition of Pakistan and India. Some of the issues women are working to change today have persisted for decades. Violence against women, sexual harassment, and political participation of women in mainstream politics will be examined and linked to issues like patriarchy, militarization and religious extremism, which are significant factors in the current political context. Key achievements, lessons learned, and remaining challenges that the Pakistani women's movement face, as well as the complexities and challenges faced by the activists in the movement, will be discussed.
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Dr. Fouzia Saeed is a social activist and has played a key role in the Women’s movement in Pakistan for the last 25 years. Much of her work has been around violence against women, sexual harassment at work place, mobility of women and prostitution. She has founded organizations and networks to respond to these issues both at the local level and through federal policy in Pakistan. Her work in international development has been as a part of the United Nation's Development Program, Action Aid (an English NGO), and Aga Khan Foundation (a Pakistani foundation) and as a consultant in over 13 countries. Her most recent book is on prostitution, (Taboo: The Hidden Culture of a Red Light Area, www.pak-philes.com/taboo ),and it has been translated into several languages and taken up by several universities as a text. She earned her doctorate in education at the University of Minnesota and was the recipient of the coveted University of Minnesota Distinguished International Alumni Award in 1998.
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