EuroPROFEM - The European Men Profeminist Network http://www.europrofem.org 

40en_vio ... Violence

Training Manual on Gender Violence
in Muslim Societies

owner-habifem(AT)undp.org
Fabio Angell [fabioangell@earthlink.net]; on behalf of SIGI is pleased to announce the release of its new training manual on gender violence
16/03/99

"Safe and Secure" assists women to identify sources of violence in the family, community, society, and state; communicate information about and

understanding of violence to others; and influence governments to formulate and implement policies that eliminate gender-based violence. It is developed to train trainers who work with service providers such as police, doctors, and judges, or grassroots-level women and men, and women's rights activists.

The model underlying the manual is culture-based, grassroots-oriented, participatory, and dialogical. It uses ideas, traditions, myths, and texts rendered in local idiom and relevant to the community in order to convey the universal concepts of rights. It promotes interaction among equals, reciprocity of roles between teacher and learner, and exchange of positions ,between communicators and audiences.

The core of "Safe and Secure" is the thirteen case-studies of violenceagainst women and girls in Muslim societies. These case studies arebased ,on factual accounts collected by SIGI.

* verbal and psychological abuse
* financial and resource coercion
* verbal and physical assaults in public spaces
* sexual harassment on the job
* forced child labor
* spousal abuse
* female genital mutilation
* rape
* prostitution
* child marriage
* honor killing
* crisis situation: state-sanctioned gender apartheid (Afghanistan)
* crisis situation: women in the midst of armed conflict (Algeria)

The order in which the case studies unfold represents an escalation from ,psychologically damaging to life-threatening forms of violence. Each case study is followed by a series of questions and interactive learning, exercises that stimulate discussion and the development of strategies ,for dealing with violence against women and girls.