16 Days of Activism - Day 3

Gender violence affects us all, making it all the more important to examine these issues and how they concern women globally. I invite you to peruse these images and think about the emotions in each portrait. These images were taken from National Geographic. I have included excerpts from the websites to offer some context, but encourage you to use the links to see other photos included in the galleries.

http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photos/windows-soul-gallery/
Here, an August 1994 photo shows a Palestinian girl holding a dove on the roof of her home in the Shati Refugee Camp in Gaza.

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2002/04/afghan-girl/index-text (google afghan girl national geographic, cause this link doesn’t always work)
The portrait by Steve McCurry turned out to be one of those images that sears the heart, and in June 1985 it ran on the cover of this magazine. Her eyes are sea green. They are haunted and haunting, and in them you can read the tragedy of a land drained by war. She became known around National Geographic as the "Afghan girl," and for 17 years no one knew her name.

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/09/somalia/maitre-photography (this is a gallery, so just have the link)
Mogadishu is ground zero for the failed state of Somalia, a place where pirates and terrorists rule. Yet to the north, the breakaway region of Somaliland is stable and at peace. What happened?

http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/photo-of-the-day/sudanese-women-olson.html
Women carry bundles of firewood on their heads in the Sudanese desert. In rural African cultures, the responsibility of foraging for firewood usually falls to the women. In Sudan's brutally dry desert, where little vegetation grows, it can take several hours each day to collect enough wood to cook with.

http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/enlarge/padaung-women_pod_image.html
Some women of the Padaung people are fitted with brass neck rings at a young age to ward off evil spirits. The weight and pressure of the added rings crush the collar bones and sometimes the ribs of these women.


Neda Said
Social Justice Peer Educator