“I would like to tell the world that we Afghan women and girls tolerate being hungry, thirsty, and poor, but we never give up our aims, and we are trying to live in a peaceful and safe country.”

— AWWP storyteller

November 10, 2016 – After decades of war and occupation, Afghanistan continues to face tremendous challenges. While the current government supports gender equality and women’s rights, daily conditions for women and girls have improved little. Rates of gender-based violence are high; the Taliban persists in its attempts to assert control; and the legacy of the ongoing conflict has left nearly 80% of women unable to read and write. Since 2009, the Afghan Women’s Writing Project (AWWP) has helped hundreds of Afghan women craft essays and poems and share them with the world. These writings enable thousands of readers each month hear directly from Afghan women on issues of personal, cultural, and political significance.

In the winter and spring of 2016, Silence Speaks collaborated with AWWP on a unique digital storytelling workshop that was conducted entirely via pre-recorded webinar sessions, individual and group Skype calls, and email exchanges. The goal of the project was to pilot test a methodology for supporting the creation of visual stories, as a way of building on AWWP’s existing written work. AWWP staff in Afghanistan recruited a small group of bilingual (Dari-English speaking) alumni of their programs, and Silence Speaks provided instruction on writing personal narrative for video, the ethics of photography and videography, and simple tips for developing visual treatments. The participants wrote short scripts, with our input and guidance; gathered and took photos and video clips to illustrate their work (those who were not able to create original visual material received assistance with illustration and videography); and uploaded these materials to us via DropBox. Given limited personal access to video editing equipment and software in Afghanistan as well as the challenges of teaching video editing in an online environment, our staff produced the final stories in California. In accordance with AWWP’s privacy policy, which exists to protect the safety and anonymity of the women who produce writing as part of the organizations programs, all identifying information has been kept confidential. “Pen” names were used, faces were blurred in photographs, and we relied on WWP partner and well-known Afghan activist Noorjahan Akbar to record the stories (in Dari with English subtitles).

The stories are currently being showcased on the AWWP web site and circulated widely via social media, to bring attention to women’s creativity and the realities of every-day life in Afghanistan. AWWP plans to share them in local communities across the country, as a way of encouraging women’s cultural and civic participation and expanding the organization’s oral storytelling project, which engages non-literate women in sharing stories as recorded testimony and broadcasts their narratives on radio outlets.

The Project: http://awwproject.org/2016/07/awwp-writers-create-powerful-videos-with-storycenters-silence-speaks/

Digital Stories: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2zMrq22-Y2uaGQBdxG38PnrQ0Mf-oVQx