16 Days - Day 15: Showtime at Zokoguhe – or, Say What?
Posted by Ann Jones on December 9th, 2007
 On the day of the photo exhibition, the whole village of Zokoguhe greeted us with dancing. Photo: Ann Jones |
| The International Rescue Committee is working with writer, photographer and long-time women’s advocate Ann Jones to give women in war zones an opportunity to document their own lives with digital cameras and make their voices heard.
Ann is blogging from Cote d’Ivoire, posting new photos and stories each day from November 25 to December 10: the ”16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence.” You can catch Ann’s earlier posts here and sign up to get e-mail alerts about tomorrow’s post and Ann’s next blog series — from Liberia — at theIRC.org/join16days. Yamoussoukro, Cote d’Ivoire Another two days elapse before the final show. Tanou and I worry about Assetou. On the way to Zokoguhe, we stop to pick up a delegation of KoupelaTenkodoko women, and there she is. She tells a story we can scarcely believe. It seems that many men asked her husband after the meeting what he thought of the things she’d said about him in public. He replied, “She has given good counsel.” When she went home, he gave her money—for the very first time—to buy food for the children. The next day she announced that she was going with us to Zokoguhe, and he gave her another 500 francs ($1.00) for the trip. So off we went ecstatic and amazed to Zokoguhe where pandemonium awaited us. People of six different ethnicities speaking six different, mutually unintelligible languages live in the village. They get along by not listening to each other. One thing they do well is dance—no language being involved. So the whole village boogied out to greet us to the beat of marimbas, drums, and cymbals. They ushered us into the meeting hall, and danced some more. Once the show started, harmony went flat. There were translators for Bete and Gouro and More and Yacouba and Senufo and Baoule and a lot of shouting in Dioula, the somewhat mutually intelligible argot of the market. Each translator talked in turn, each translation longer than the one before, and while one language was shouted out, speakers of the other five languages fell into noisy chatter with their neighbors. Meanwhile, all the village children—there are hundreds—played uproarious games around the perimeter of the meeting hall. Tanou asked a drummer to call people to attention with his drum, but when he banged on it, they all started dancing again.
Somehow Tanou managed to introduce the show. The women managed to come forward to show their photos and say a few words into the din. And all the old men seated around the village chief—an aged and somnolent guy in a battered fedora—managed to stand up and shout offensive things about women.Whatever trouble women have, they ask for it. If they’re abandoned, they deserve it. If they’re forced to do all the work, that’s what they’re here for. If they’re beaten, they earned it. At last I understood why women in Zokoguhe had taken so many photos of violence against women. It is routine in this village. There is nothing to deter it. Certainly no tribal leadership to stand against it. A man can beat up his wife in public without risking interference, or even the bad opinion of his neighbors. Being caught by a photographer is nothing to him. Yet the women chose not a single photo of violence for the exhibition. They didn’t raise the subject. They already knew what the men would say: If they’re beaten they earned it.
Yet even here, in this hostile cacophony, the women scored points. One dared to show a photo of her family’s cocoa crop. She said, “When it is time to work on the cocoa, the husband calls it ‘ours.’ But when it is time to sell, he calls it ‘mine.’” Her photo shows harvested cocoa beans spread out like a gray carpet, with a tiny cluster set to one side for the woman, the principal day laborer on the farm. For women it’s a question of fairness. But an old man warns: “You’ll get in trouble if you start talking profits.” The women try to talk instead about sharing household chores, as the women of Zatta and KoupelaTenkodoko did with some success. But men have ready excuses. One says he couldn’t possibly carry water for his wives because he has three of them; he would grow tired. And carrying water for only one wife would be unfair to those left out. Better to treat his wives equally, as the Prophet commands, by not helping any of them at all. He is big on equality.
Two women show photos of young husbands helping their wives pound maize into meal. It’s an onerous task, performed with a wooden pestle almost as big as a woman. (I also have photographed several young men of Zokoguhe helping their wives pound maize, but young men seem to have no voice in this meeting.) Arguments break out in six languages, until the old chief stands up to announce his verdict. “It might be permissible,” he says, “for a husband to perform certain tasks from time to time, if he wants to, to assist his wife.” Bringing a little firewood would be one such task. It is the only one he can think of. But as for pounding the maize, it is women’s work, shameful for a man.
I might have wept about this day, but for two things. First, the women of Zokoguhe were just as proud of themselves for speaking up in public as the women of Zatta and KoupelaTenkodoko had been. Never mind that no one heard. Nobody hears much of anything in noisy Zokoguhe. The important thing is: they spoke. And second: When we held our final women’s meeting after the show, Samandougoulou Assetou stood up and told her story to the women of Zokoguhe. “I spoke up to my husband,” she said, “and my husband changed. It is a lesson. Do not be afraid.
Delegates from KoupelaTenkodoko attending the Zokoguhe show were Yougoubare Antoinette |
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December 9th, 2007 at 10:57 am
Do the men wear sandals, but the women have to be barefoot????
December 9th, 2007 at 12:26 pm
I should like to see the Chief of Zokoguhe and his notables pounded with the maize. Great effort to make some kind of social change in the face of appeals to authority, conservative tradition, and a clear lack of human empathy.
December 9th, 2007 at 12:46 pm
I posted a comment on todays edition (below), I would like to retract the first sentence as it is unhelpful and reflects an instant anger I experienced on reading this post. Violence is the inherent problem after all. My apologies.
December 9th, 2007 at 1:39 pm
Wonderful work you are doing! Even if little changes in those countries—at first—bringing these situations into the open, letting the rest of the world know, will changing everyting, eventually. Perhaps for the Assetou’s daughter.
December 9th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
To bring change around with the old is difficult for anybody but we can still teach change to our children. I have done so and they (my sons)outshine their own fellow male cousins. They bring a pride to their whole paternal family but it is me to whom they give credit for teaching them how to be a awesome Man. You Ladies can still bring change. It will just take patience and time to see the fruit of your Labors. Bon Chance!
December 9th, 2007 at 4:13 pm
I was so relieved to read about the way things turned out for Assetou. I worried that her husband might have beat her to death for the brave things she said. Instead, he seems to finally see her as a person, and is beginning to show her the respect she deserves. One can only hope that he continues to feel this way. Change may be slow in coming, but I believe that when courageous women like Assetou find their voices, things will begin to change.
December 9th, 2007 at 4:50 pm
I would be very interested to hear from the children; what did they feel when their mothers spoke out? Are they even “allowed” to speak up? The photo of the little girl in the pink dress touches my heart, I can’t help but wonder what the future holds for her…
December 9th, 2007 at 6:50 pm
I gave up an alleluia for Assetou….I hope someone follows up to see that she is still safe.
December 10th, 2007 at 12:04 am
It is so encouraging to hear that women have been given a voice. I can only hope that the women are able to band together and fight for basic equality rights. They will be stronger together. Also if they are able to get the older women on their side, it will really help as these women may change the minds of their own sons.
I commend all involved in this project. And I do pray for the safety of the local Ivory Coast women.
December 10th, 2007 at 1:02 am
I supprte any action that must be done to prevent the humanety all over the world, Even in Africa so as to protect women and childern, the photos and the stories are very amazing,
Together to collect all the our efforts to stop this viollence.
December 10th, 2007 at 3:01 am
“The natural order of things” is unspeakably UNnatural.
It is very sad but very hopeful. It is Sad because women and children are human beings and people actually have to be told that!! No matter how much I know about the way people are, it nonetheless is beyond my comprehension how people can define other people to be inferior and with a clear conscience (supposedly!) go about their business after doing harm to people they claim to love.
It is Hopeful because the women in these three villages are making progress and demonstrating immense strength and courage. And some men are actually listening to their wives. Not all of the men in this world are devoid of compassion for the people who give them sexual pleasure, nurture the children, do the work, suffer at their hands.
It is beyond my comprehension how men can get all of that from women and believe dirty things like “they want it; they deserve it; they need it; it is good for them; they earned it.”
NO WOMAN ON EARTH WANTS IT, DESERVES IT, NEEDS IT, EARNS IT.
December 10th, 2007 at 8:32 am
I have lived in West Africa and have an idea of what it’s like for women in rural villages, and the strong paternal challenges they face, despite how hard they work. I also currently do a lot of work in the US in the movement to stop violence against women. While I was originally a little unsure how a photo project could help these village women, after reading these posts, I see what powerful idea it was.
Change is always hard, and these women have a lot of obstacles ahead of them. However, this project gave them two important resources - the realization that they have a voice, and can stand up and express themselves, even if it seems like no one is listening (eventually someone will); and also the realization that they are stronger standing together and supporting each other. Yes, men can and do hold women back from achieving their full potential as human beings, but women can also do this as well by dividing themselves, and not supporting each other. I’ve seen many women, who while they understand what is happening to other women is wrong, will not support or help them, for fear of losing their own (precarious) position and perceived benefits. But every time a woman’s human rights (or anyone’s) are allowed to be infringed on, it just makes it easier for it to happen to someone else. These women demonstrated that they can take an idea like this and run with it, making it a success for themselves and future generations of girls. I hope they can continue this success.
December 10th, 2007 at 9:54 am
I have been profoundly affected by the words and photos of the West African women and Ann Jones.
The photos of the men beating women, and above all,the photo of the man smiling while he beats his wife, are truly shocking.
As racism has been recognised universally as unacceptable, I look forward to the day when there will be an end to this terrible violence.
December 10th, 2007 at 1:34 pm
A small step but notable nonetheless. Speaking up is always the first and most significant step. Not to be morbid, but if the young men are learning to share the chores with their wives and if the only voices of protest are coming from the elder men… well, let’s just say that nobody’s immortal. It’s something!
December 10th, 2007 at 2:10 pm
What amazes me is we still see this same behavior in black young males in America today. It makes me think of Carl Jung and his theory of the collective consciousness of genetic groups. Many have changed in our country. I only pray the beautiful women of Africa do not have to wait as many generations.
December 26th, 2007 at 2:39 pm
Ann’s work here is amazing…. even if just one women’s life has improved, even if just one man has made a realization that his behavior is wrong, it was worth it. However it was more than that…these women’s lives and the lives of their children will forever be changed by this project. These women now realize that they have power in unity and conciousness raising has taken it’s first step.
Good luck to them.