PRESS RELEASE
Press Release - International Programs Newsletter Bloomington
IUPUI Hosts African Women's Conference
This past October, Obioma Nnaemeka (French & Women’s Studies, IUPUI), convened a five-day long conference entitled "Second International Conference on Women in Africa and the African Diaspora: Health and Human Rights." The meetings, organized around the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, drew over 400 participants from 35 countries and 47 national and international non-governmental organizations. Official delegations from Guinea, Madagascar and Burkina Faso also attended. Countries represented include Mali, Togo, Nigeria, Gambia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Morocco, Egypt, Zimbabwe, Botswana, South Africa, Australia, Bangladesh, India, Vietnam, Germany, Switzerland, and the United States.
Nnaemeka spent two years preparing for the October conference, soliciting papers from around the world and receiving over 500 proposals. She read through each one, and managed to narrow it down to approximately two hundred presenters. One of the keynote speakers was Nawal El Saadawi, an Egyptian physician, feminist and activist, who was imprisoned by Anwar Sadat due to her organizing efforts on behalf of Egyptian women. Nnaemeka said she used the conference "to pay tribute to El Saadawi and her life-long work and contributions to women."
Photo: Conference participants at luncheon: from left, Naana Banyiwa Horne (English, IUK), Obioma Nnaemeka, and Sabine Jell-Bahlsen (from Germany).The Women in Africa and the African Diaspora (WAAD) conference was meant to promote the causes of women of African descent throughout the world, with special emphases on health and human rights. Panel topics included widowhood and property rights, armed conflict, African American women and health policies in the United States, immigration, sexuality, female circumcision, HIV, domestic violence and the law, traditional medicine, and reproductive rights.
Photo: Obioma Nnaemeka (left), with Mama Adokuwa-Asigble IV, Queen Mother of Tefle, Ghana.Hailed as a tremendous success by both participants and news media, the conference had an extremely high proportion of Africa-based participants-approximately fifty percent. Nnaemeka says that "contrary to the tragic and apocolyptic cloud which hangs over conferences on Africa held outside Africa, a celebratory tone pervaded the WAAD conference and refused to dissipate. Stories of perseverence and songs of triumph rent the air as...participants admitted that the problems were there but also insisted that they were doing something about them and have prevailed in doing so."
Nnaemeka will compile the more than 150 conference papers into a multi-volume set of proceedings, as she did after the first WAAD conference, held in Nsukka, Nigeria in 1992. She will then select from among these for the publication of an edited volume. WAAD's first conference led to the formation of the Association of African Women Scholars (AAWS), of which Nnaemeka is president. AAWS has initiated and promoted collaborative work between researchers, activists, and policy makers in Africa and those outside the continent, and has also lent its voice to campaigns against human rights violations in Africa (for further information, visit their web site at http://www.iupui.edu/~aaws/). There are plans to commence publication of a scholarly journal to be titled "Journal of Women in Africa and the African Diaspora."
The next WAAD conference will be held in October 2000 in
Madagascar. The topic will be "Facing the New Millennium: Gender in Africa and the African Diaspora-Retrospections and Prospects."
Erika A. Blum (International Programs Newsletter, February 1999)
IUPUI to host African Women's Meeting Women, men and children from 35 countries and 47 international, non-government organizations will converge on IUPUI Oct. 23 through 27 for a conference focusing on African women’s issues.
Scholars, activists, policy makers, researchers and students will meet for the Second International Conference on Women in Africa and the Africa Diaspora: Health & Human Rights.
Conference presentations will begin at 4 p.m. daily at the University Place Hotel and Conference Center.
Obioma Nnaemeka, professor of French and women’s studies, will host this global event.
"There has not been a conference that has happened here of this dimension," Nnaemeka said.
Nnaemeka has spent the last two years preparing for the conference, which received an overwhelming, geographically-diverse response from potential speakers.
She received over 500 proposals from people all over the world interested in making a presentation at the conference. Nnaemeka read every proposal, and because of accommodation limitations, she had to narrow her selection to around 200 proposals.
It was a great achievement for many of those who wanted to speak at the conference — just to get the proposal sent through the overseas mail process may have cost them a week’s salary.
WAAD is just one of many worldwide events organized in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which encourages progressive strategies for the promotion of human rights on a global scale.
The speakers Nnaemeka chose to present at the conference are diverse along socioeconomic and occupational backgrounds and include midwives, healers who employ alternative medicine techniques, scholars and members of UNICEF, which will fly seven children to Indianapolis for a display in language and literacy. Presenters will discuss topics related to the mental and physical well-being of women of African descent, as well as other issues which affect their overall health, including the economy, human rights, education, cultural practices and ethnic conflicts.
Trends in morbidity and mortality in African women and the impact of medical research are among underlying themes for the conference. Factors of climatic conditions and the result of food shortages will also be addressed.
There is also an escalation of conflicts involving weapons and politics on the African continent that has had a great impact on human rights and health issues involving women of African descent.
Nnaemeka fears there are misconceptions in regards to the continent.
"Africa is not about disaster," she said. "It is about people building strong communities."
The conference, through workshops, panels and forums, will allow participants to share success stories. The education will promote growth of women of African descent and promote a stronger role for them in their respective societies.
WAAD will promote bridge-building between Africa and African Diaspora through contrasting the inherent differences between urban and rural environments and the roles of scholars, activists, educators, students, theorists and practitioners.
Nawal El Saadawi, a native Egyptian physician, writer, feminist, scholar and activist, will make the keynote address from 1 to 3 p.m. Oct. 25. El Saadawi was imprisoned by a former Egyptian leader, Anwar Sadat, for her strong efforts to promote women’s causes in that nation. She is recognized all over the world for her sacrifice and dedication.
"I am using the conference to pay tribute to (El Saadawi) and her life-long work and contributions to women," she said.
Nnaemeka has devoted a tremendous amount of time and energy to planning the conference.
"Sometimes through this project, I feel like Sisyphus with his rock," she added.
Nnaemeka is president of the Association of African Women and Scholars, which boasts a global membership of men and women of many races and nationalities and is planning a scholarly-refereed journal to be titled the "Journal of African Women’s Studies."
After the proceedings, Nnaemeka will compile the 200 presentations — an assignment that took her three and a half years after the first conference in 1992.
Additional information about the conference is on the Internet at
http://www.iupui.edu~aaws/.To register, contact Nnaemeka at 278-2038 or nnaemeka@iupui.edu.
Return to the AAWS Main Menu
