GMDC Diversity Exchange, Issue 11, October 2010

Date: October 1, 2010

Diversity Exchange

Issue 11 | October 2010

Contents

Welcome Note

Welcome to the Diversity Exchange newsletter, a product of the Gender and Media Diversity Centre. This newsletter assists us in delivering to you relevant information, breaking news and dialogues or debates taking place in thesphere of gender and the media. While we work globally,included are first-hand perspectives from the African continent, as well as reflections in the worldwide forum. We hope that you will use this platform as a tool to voice your own thoughts on media, gender and diversity issues in times to come. Thanks for reading!


		GMDC News

Gender and Media Summit and Awards

Gender Links has received more than 200 submissions for the Gender and Media Awards, October 13 – 15, 2010. These submissions, as well as input from the Summit, will feed into the GMDC’s upcoming journal. Prior to the Summit, the GMDC will host its biannual Advisory Group Meeting. In line with the Summit, the theme of this meeting is also “taking stock” of the GMDC. Read more…

New publication: Gender in Media Education in Southern Africa

The final product of the 13-country research initiative has finally come to fruition. The Audit of Gender in Media Education in Southern Africa (GIME) is the most comprehensive study undertaken of the gender dimensions of journalism and media education and training in tertiary institutions in Southern Africa. The study was administered in 25 institutions across SADC including in Botswana, DRC, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe, between October 2009 and April 2010. The publication will be launced on 13 October 2010 and is available for sale. Read more…

The GMDC makes it official

Memorandums of Understanding are signed between Gender Links and partners. To date Gender Links, through the GMDC, has signed official MOUs with the following institutions: International Womens Media Foundation, Liza Gross; The Polytechnic of Namibia, Emily Brown; The National University of Science and Technology, Kathy Matsika; The University of Botswana, David Kerr; ZAMCOM, Daniel Nkalamo; and the African Women and Child Feature Service, Rosemary Okello (pending). These MOUs allow space for greater collaboration and connection amongst those committed to the GMDCs mandates. Read more…

Ear on radio

Step by Step: Our Stories. Mozambique

Step by Step: Our Stories is a project recently launched by World Without Mines and CMFD Productions that shares the stories of landmine survivors in Mozambique. By telling their stories through audio narratives designed for community radio and visual digital stories, participants are helping to raise awareness about landmines and the long-lasting impact on individuals, families, and communities. Read more…

Intitiute of Development Studies: Gender stereotyping workshop

Gender Links recently took part in the think-tank workshop Gender Stereotypes: a Preliminary Mapping For the Expert Brainstorm Workshop on Gender Stereotypes. This event was hosted by BRIDGE and the Institute of Development Studies with support from SIDA, and took place in Brighton, Sussex, United Kingdom from September 15th -16th, 2010. The goal of the IDS/BRIDGE workshop was to identify entry-points and promising policy responses to challenge gender stereotyping. Read more…

Namibia: Gender Toolkit for Educators

Emily Brown, head of the department of journalism at the Polytechnic of Namibia (PON) is creating a gender toolkit for educators, commissioned by the UNESCO office in Windhoek. In order to devise this toolkit, Brown conducted a gender-awareness survey. The educators surveyed were teachers at Namibia’s high schools and colleges, trainers at the Institute for Educational Development, and Journalism educators at the PON and University of Namibia. 119 interviews were conducted in Windhoek, Okahandja and Rehoboth comprising: Schools = 17; Colleges = 6; Institutes = 1; and Universities = 3 Read more…

IFJ Calls on Unions to Confront Crisis of Gender Bias in the News

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has called for a debate in newsrooms about how to better report gender issues and has given its backing to a global campaign to combat sexist reporting. The IFJ says it is time for serious gender-sensitive reporting discussions inside the media and for action to support fair, non-sexist reporting in the news following the publication of the recent Global Media Monitoring Project (GMMP), which found that women are still significantly underrepresented and misrepresented in news media coverage. Read more…

Eye on video

WITNESS announces campaign to end gender-based violence

On Tuesday 21 September at the Clinton Global Initiative, WITNESS, a New York-based video advocacy organisation, announced their commitment to ending GBV. WITNESS will partner with the network Womens Initiatives for Gender Justice to train 50 of its member groups to use video to document violence against women and girls living in armed conflict and under repressive governments. WITNESS believes that visual storytelling will strengthen a movement for change. A woman with a video camera in her hands is a powerful voice. Read more…


		Seminars

MDGs @ 10 – Still missing the gender mark?

On Tuesday 21 September, Gender Links hosted a debate and discussion: MDGs at 10 – Still missing the gender mark? This was hosted parallel with the UN General Assembly review of the MDGs from 20-22 September 2010. As world leaders met in New York to strategise on the way forward, Gender Links took stock of the situation in Southern Africa and shone a critical light on some of the key issues in the region, particularly around gender.

The workshop discussion addressed ways to move forward to ensure that five or ten years from now the MDGs have been expanded and enhanced to properly address the many gender dimensions pertinent to development in the region. Read more…

GIME and GMPS workshops: Media has failed women

Gender Links recently hosted verification and advocacy workshops in 14 SADC countries to assess and follow up on the GIME and GMPS research from August to September 2010. Following these workshops, seminars were held on the theme: Media has failed women in Southern Africa. At each workshop the focus was country specific and not regional. Undoubtedly, the seminars stirred up some heated debate among the delegates. While many do believe that the media is failing women, other stick to the premise that women have failed themselves. Read more…


		Upcoming Events

Botswana Librarians meeting: 3 -9 December, 2010

The 19th Standing Conference of Eastern, Central, & Southern Africa Library and Information Associations (SCECSAL) 2010 Conference will take place in Gaborone, Botswana from 3-9 December 2010. Papers and discussions will address the Conference theme: Enhancing Democracy and Good Governance through Effective Information and Knowledge Services. Read more…

African Same-Sex Sexualities and Gender Diversity: Practices, Identities and Communities

Call for abstract submissions for the Conference on African Same-Sex Sexualities and Gender Diversity: Practices, Identities and Communities. This conference will be held in Pretoria, South Africa, 13-16 February 2011. Read more…

International Gender and Education Conference

The Gender and Education Association is hosting the 8th International Gender and Education Conference, to be held at Exeter University from 27-30 April 2011. The theme for the 2011 conference is Gender and Education: Past, Present and Future. A theme that was inspired by a special edition of the journal Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, published in 2008. In this special edition guest editors sought to trace changes that have occurred in the field of gender and education in recent years and discuss the explosion of interest that has arisen in this area. The conference organising committee welcome a range of papers. Read more…


		GMDC Databases

Clippings

Giving condoms to prisoners would be suicidal_Midweek Sun

This clipping is an opinion/letter by J. C. Buru about Rev. Doctor John Seakgosing who is contemplating giving condoms to prisoners as a way of helping to curb the virus infection among inmates. Read more…

Mngxitama wrong on Microbicide-Sowetan

In his column in The Sowetan on 27 July 2010 (Research on HIV prevention gel put black lives at risk), Andile Mngixitama viciously attacks South African researchers who recently announced a huge breakthrough in the development of a microbicide, a gel that they hope women will be able to use to reduce the risk of their being infected with HIV from sex. Under the guise of black consciousness he distorts facts, takes an opinion on something he knows little about and makes statements that will cause life-threatening confusion. Read more…

Top ANC leader lashes leading party figures over sexism – Sunday Times

Thenjiwe Mtintso , ambassador to Italy and a member of the ANCs national executive committee, has lashed out at leading figures in the ANC who have made statements that may be perceived as sexist. Some ANC members and even leading figures have been fingered in gender-based violence. The zero tolerance the ANC shows against any racism or racial connotations has not, in recent years, been as strong when it comes to sexism, she wrote in the party’s online letter ANC Today. Read more…

Research

Understanding intimate femicide in South Africa

When a woman is killed she is most likely to be murdered by an intimate partner. This form of homicide known as intimate femicide is conceptualised to be the most extreme consequence of intimate partner violence. Not much is known about such killings in South Africa or in other developing settings. This thesis studied intimate femicide using two complimentary studies from two methodological perspectives. The first study was quantitative with the aim of describing the incidence and pattern of intimate femicide in South Africa. The second study used qualitative methods and explored the social construction of the early formation of violent masculinities. Read more…

Halving Hunger: Still Possible? Building a rescue package to set the MDGs back on track

While time is running out, the global crises push the MDGs desperately off course. The only chance of avoiding failure is a rescue plan for all MDGs that includes the necessary measures, both political and financial. Halving hunger is still possible if developing countries take the lead with the right policies and investments, donor countries increase dramatically their aid to agriculture, food security and social protection under nationally and regionally-driven plans, and the global issues affecting food security are collectively addressed. Read more…

Achieving visibility in war: an analysis of womens participation in conflict and post-conflict situations since the end of the Cold War

This thesis purpose is to review the literature that has been produced on the topic of women in war since the end of the Cold War from a feminist perspective. Through this approach, this thesis will attempt to not only provide a concise overview of the literature produced on the above-mentioned topic, but through this literature review, to also make the roles of both men and women in war visible. In doing so, this thesis aims to generate an understanding of the ways in which both women and men are involved in and affected by armed conflict, as well as the ways in which gender roles, the relations between men and women are changed during and as a result of conflict. Read more…

Case Studies

Life in Congo – The Star

First, the rebels killed four of Joseph Munyanezaââ‚¬â„¢s children in 1997. The family fled to another village. The following year, that village came under siege. Another four children died of gunshot wounds. Then the baby, of malnutrition. Today Munyaneza, a 52-year-old Protestant pastor tenderly cares for his 17-year-old daughter who is in hospital after being kidnapped by rebels a month ago. When the rebels tired of raping her skinny body, they forced a stick up her vagina until it protruded through her side. Read more…

Lashes of Inspiration – The Times

Male sports presenters need to beware. Their job security will be on the line if 27-year-old Mabasotho Lenko has anything to do with it. Lenko is determined to become South Africa’s premier sports presenter. Currently on Weekend Live, she gives viewers a lively update on the week’s fouls, red cards and goals scored. Becoming a sports presenter was completely accidental, she says. She studied marketing at the IMM Graduate School of Marketing. Read more…

Plenty of opportunities for women, says Zille – The Star

Why I believe in South Africa was the topic of guest speaker Hellen Zille at a Women of the World’s breakfast held in Sandton yesterday in honour of women’s month. “The World Cup changed the image of South Africa. Even the sceptics were surprised. We had powerful leaders and the people of South Africa chose to lead them. I believe in optimism. I was personally told by a top ranking official that the games in Cape Town were the best in the world, beating even Germany,” she said. Read more…

Publications

Gender in Media Education: An audit of Gender in Journalism & Media Education and Training

The Gender in Media Education in Southern Africa (GIME) is the most comprehensive audit yet undertaken of the gender dimensions of journalism and media education and training in tertiary institutions in Southern Africa. Read more…

Girls Investigate: Social Medias Merits & Minuses

Adults are often too fast to condemn teenagers use of technology. We are not as clueless about online threats as some adults believe. Two-thirds of the teens who have created profiles have used privacy controls to limit access to them. For example, social media is a great tool for activism. As the leader of my schools chapter of Girls Learn International, Inc., I have found that e-mail and Facebook messages are invaluable for organizing and spreading awareness. If social media is used intelligently, it can yield endless benefits. Read more…

Namibia: Women in Violence Slave Camps

Executive Director of Women’s Action for Development (WAD) Veronica de Klerk has condemned gender-based violence and called on women to refrain from withdrawing cases against perpetrators of violence against them. I appeal to all women, instead, to strive towards freeing themselves from the scourge of gender-based violence, by opening cases against perpetrators of violence against them; and to seek protection orders against perpetrators and not to withdraw cases, in order to bring them to book, De Klerk said. De Klerk made the statement at a graduation ceremony of 120 unemployed students who attended a multidisciplinary training course in the Okongo district of the Ohangwena Region on Thursday. Read more…


		Internships				Members

Internships

Intern’s Perspective

Justice Intern, Kelello Tekateka

The best way to conceptualise my internship at Gender Links is as a sink or swim experience. Aware of Gender Links reputation in the sector and of the types of projects the organisation takes on, my hopes when starting this internship were to gain as much experience as possible within the short time frame, and to get a better idea of how issues of gender and development are addressed in practice. Read more…

Members

NUST lecturer produces research on LGBTI

Blessing Jona, lecturer of Journalism and Media Studies at the National University of Science and Technology (NUST) in Zimbabwe, has begun an in-depth research study to assess the role of media in attitude change on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (lgbti) constructs in society. This study will analyse two popular South African soap operas, “Generations” and “Society” to track attitudes and representation of lgbti issues. Read more…

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GMDC Diversity Exchange, Issue 11, October 2010

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