Global South Geographies and Feminist Solidarity for Just Recovery
Make it Grow presented at this year's Royal Geographical Society annual conference in the session: global south geographies and feminist solidarity for just recovery. Led by Pamela Richardson and Alexandra Plummer, we focused on our collaboration with Kufunda's Women Are Medicine empowerment programme in Zimbabwe.
YOUNG WOMEN ARE MEDICINE is a programme where together we return to the grace, the power and the pride in what it means to be a woman... to make the most of the gifts and strengths of women in Zimbabwe today - Kufunda Village
Covid-19 and its lockdowns uniquely impacted women in Zimbabwe, including disproportionately preventing movement, increasing social isolation, increasing childcare and caregiving responsibilities, and increased domestic abuse towards women and children.
Alongside Kufunda Village, we wanted to foster a safe, accessible space for women to share stories and learn video-making skills. We therefore collaborated for the Women Are Medicine empowerment programme, and created an all-female WhatsApp group.
Here, facilitation approaches were used in workshops to cultivate a sense of connection and solidarity amongst the participants.
We found that facilitation of women's video story circles via WhatsApp can be effective with regard to participant experience of solidarities. Accompanying research supported this.
Many participants expressed the
positive experience they had while
taking part on the workshop series,
one quoted "sisterhood brings you
together" and another "I have this
feeling of oneness", which we are very happy to have played a part in
fostering.
Kufunda is a learning centre in Zimbabwe, it is a place of learning, where individuals can recover their sense of pride, diversity and capacity in working with their own knowledge to create a healthy and vibrant community.
It supports communities to heal their social fabric, acknowledging and using the wealth and resources they have; and enabling them to become strong, empowered agents of their own destiny. Kufunda are discovering a great power in a community that collectively chooses to move towards health and possibility.
Find out more at https://www.kufunda.org/about