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InternationalWOMENEileen GironEileen Giron has polio, uses a wheelchair and is one of El Salvador's most effective disability rights leaders. She is the Executive Director of a work co-op of people with disabilities producing and selling pottery and providing some basic services to disabled people outside the co-op. El Salvador, is currently in reconstruction after a bloody civil war, and Giron describes the experiences of those with disabilities during and after the war and how she acquired a disability consciousness and developed her organization amid difficult conditions. See radio interview and print transcript. Farhat Rehman Women who have disabilities are among the poorest and
most pollitically marginalized people in the world. However, they are also
among the most resourceful. Farhat Rehman facilitates a group called
Promotion of Women's Employment and Rehabilitation, POWER. In this program she tells us about the lives of disabled women in Pakistan and how the women are working to improve conditions. Lizzie Longsho Lizzie Longsho is the Coordinator of women's groups for
the National Council of Persons with Disabilities of Zimbabwe. In this
capacity, Longsho has first-hand experiences with the conditions of disabled
women in Zimbabwe and other parts of Southern Africa. In this interview she
discusses the everyday lives of her constituents and emphasizes the need for
reproductive health education and choice for women with disabilities. Margaret Orach Since the International Campaign to Ban Landmines won
the Nobel Peace Prize, we hear more in the news reports about the
victims/survivors of landmines. But the people who are the most devastated
by them are the one's we hear about the least, women and children. Margaret
Orach became an amputee in 1998 in her native Uganda. A landmine blew apart
the van she was traveling in. In this program she tells us about her own
experience as a woman landmine survivor and about those of other women whose stories need to be told. McClaine MushekaThis program examines the problem of violence and
sexual assault of deaf women in Southern Africa. McClaine Musheka helped
organize the first pan-African conference of deaf people and discusses this
important meeting as well as her own story as a deaf African woman. Her
remarks follow those of United States Secretary of State Madeline Albright
on U.S. Government policy and violence against women with disabilities. Remat Fazelbhoy Remat Fazelbhoy and her three sisters were born
albino, meaning that their skin, hair and eyes had no pigmentation. In
1920's India, having albinism with its visual impairment, white skin and
hair set them apart from their society and their family. In this program,
Remat Fazelbhoy explains how she became educated in spite of the prejudice
around her and introduced many of the techniques of integrated education for
people with disabilities that are still used in India today. Shanor Forbes and Ranjana KulkarniMany women in India who acquire a
disability after they are married are abandoned by their husbands. Sometimes
they also lose their children but the two women in this program are proof
that it doesn¹t have to be that way. Shanor Forbes and Ranjana Kulkarni are
both wives, mothers and quadriplegic. Also, they both chose to return to
their native India where accessibility is still a far off dream. IMPORTANT WORKS:Disabled Women: Disability Awareness in Action, Resource Kit #6 International Leadership for Women with Disabilities, June 1997, Final Report Pengra, L. M., & Godfrey, J. G. (2001). Different Boundaries, Different Barriers: Disability Studies and Lakota Culture (Summer 2001, Volume 21, No. 3), [online journal]. Disability Studies Quarterly. Available: [2003, 9-29-2003]. “Violence and Disabled Women” [Europe] Women and Disability (Dr. Fatima Shah, Pakistan,, Zohra Rajah,Mauritius, Diane Driedger) RESOURCES: LINKS National Disability Arts Forum (UK) -
Includes database of EUROPEAN artists with disabilities - as well as some O’Toole, C.J. (2000) Women: Disabled Women And Independent Living in Brazil, Germany, Great Britain, India, Japan, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Russia, South Africa and Uganda. Disability World, August-September 2000, Issue No. 4 RESOURCES: BIBLIOGRAPHYDreidger, Diane, Dueck, Susan, & Gray, Susan (Eds). (1992) Imprinting Our Images: An International Anthology by Women with Disabilities. Gynergy Books/Ragweed Press, 1992 Nakanishi, Y. O. (1998). Situation of women with disabilities in Asia. In B. Duncan & R. B. Bieler (Eds.), International Leadership Forum for Women with Disabilities: Final Report. New York: Rehabilitation International. O'Toole, C.J. & Bregante, J.L. (1993c). Identifying Barriers to the inclusion of disabled women in the international women's movement. Paper presented at the Fifth International Interdisciplinary Congress on Women, San Jose, Costa Rica, February 22-25, 1993. Women with Disabilities in Asia - Request the issue of Women in Action No. 2, 2001 by mail from Isis-International-Manila, P.O. Box 1837, Quezon City Main, Quezon City 1100, Philippines or via email communications@isiswomen.org |
