How often do you hear this said?
What does it stir up in you?
Disappointment?
Or determination?
“It can’t be done” is a phrase the New Dawn community services group won’t accept!
They’ve heard it said that local women can’t talk on the media about topics that are considered shameful in their culture. Determined to see women in their village able to have more control over their health, the team have come up with a solution.
Working in partnership with HCR Pakistan, New Dawn has bought a speakerbox (pictured) which can be taken into homes or places where women meet together. Women’s listener groups will use the speakerbox to play podcasts from an SD card.
New Dawn health worker with speakerbox for women’s listener groups.
At the same time, a team of women, trained in making radio programmes, are using the New Dawn recording studio to create podcasts about women’s health issues. The speakerbox gives the team freedom to get into the details of topics - details that are considered too shameful for radio broadcast. Topics for the podcasts include early marriage, women’s hygiene before, during and after giving birth, breastfeeding and post-natal childcare.
They will also be free to talk about conflict sensitive issues such as vaccination, giving people space to challenge politically motivated rumours and cultural myths.
New Dawn women’s recording team creating podcasts. KPK, Pakistan. 2020.
Compared to radio, the speakerbox reaches a relatively small number of women at any one time. However, it will open up important new spaces for dialogue. Instead of individuals suffering alone, women and girls will learn together and have freedom to talk about difficult issues with women in similar situations. The podcasts are conversation starters, containing a mix of expert advice and community opinion.
The New Dawn (known as Naway Saher locally) team works in a fairly remote village near Charsadda in Khyber Pakhtunkhwah (KPK) in Pakistan. Since 2017 Community members have been creating regular radio programmes broadcast in community slots on a local commercial station. These programmes prompt discussion about health, hygiene, social-inclusion and local infrastructure. For a long time, the local health worker and the ladies’ health worker have wanted to use media to tackle issues that severely impact women’s health but have been restricted by cultural sensitivities. Perhaps this can’t be done in these communities using a broadcast radio. But we are grateful for the perseverance of the New Dawn volunteers to insist that it “must be done”.
We hope that the combination of speakerbox and women’s production team is successful in empowering women and improving their lives in this village. We would love to see the concept used in more villages in the district.