– Kenya Teen Devised FGM App – Alternative Analysis of Grass-Roots Dynamics on FGM – School Holidays Can Be FGM Cutting Season”

A 14-year-old girl in Burkina Faso who has decided not to undergo female genital cutting, pictured with her parents (Jessica Lea/ U.K. Department for International Development).

By Kim Yi Dionne – August 18, 2017

When it comes to female genital cutting, headlines provoke and call out for concern. One headline called it the “curse of blades and powders,” while another warned that school holidays were a “cutting season.”

This month a team of Kenyan teenagers have received a lot of media attention for creating a mobile phone app, i-Cut, geared toward affected girls that helps them get medical and legal assistance. The team is celebrated because it proposes using technology to solve what is seen as an archaic injustice.

Given the way female genital cutting is talked about in the West, the title of this post is controversial. Human rights groups and advocates refer to female genital cutting as female genital mutilation, because doing so “identifies the practice as a human rights violation because of the violence associated with the procedure and because it is mostly carried out on young girls.”

In this week’s installment of the African Politics Summer Reading Spectacular, we draw insights about female genital cutting from Bennington College anthropologist Miroslava Prazak’s latest book, “Making the Mark: Gender, Identity, and Genital Cutting.”

“Making the Mark” provides a richly detailed grass-roots perspective of the procedure (and of male circumcision) among the Kuria people in southern Kenya. Through this perspective, Prazak’s book offers three important lessons that are often overlooked in the international debate over female genital cutting

1. While circumcision is a tradition, its practice has transformed over time in response to changing circumstances. From Prazak’s book: “. . . this set of rituals is not unchanging and does not follow a primordial mold, even though people connect the acts of today with the practices of their ancestors. Instead, the rituals are a part of people’s lives and are always responsive to the exigencies of everyday life and the various influences on the practice.” In Chapter 4 of her book, Prazak shows how national campaigns against female genital mutilation have spurred dialogue among girls about to undergo genital cutting and how HIV/AIDS awareness campaigns have made alternative forms — particularly medicalized female genital cutting — more acceptable.
2. In some cases, girls decide whether to undergo female genital cutting, but their decisions are made according to a broader context of family desires and community norms. There are two girls featured in Prazak’s book who demonstrate this: Leah Mokami and Janet Robi (names are pseudonyms). Twelve-year-old Leah had decided not to be cut, arguing with “her immediate family that she could become an adult without having her genitals cut.” But as initiation season approached, she faced pressure from her sisters and mother, and she changed her mind. Janet, on the other hand, was supported by her parents in her decision not to undergo genital cutting; her parents protected her from neighbors’ harassment and spoke with extended family to convince them to support Janet’s decision. Her experience suggests there is room for girls to have agency, but Leah’s experience demonstrates the constraints of that agency.
3. The women and girls who are the intended beneficiaries of international advocacy campaigns are the ones who initially face significant costs in foregoing female genital cutting. As Prazak writes, “. . . women who abandon the practice often have a lot to lose: their position in the community is affected, they are less desired as marriage partners. . . . To them, it does not appear that ending female genital cutting will improve their rights and status in the community.”

While Prazak’s book examines female genital cutting only among one population in Kenya, it provides a model for understanding the grass-roots dynamics shaping the practice. “Making the Mark” points out how national bans and negative political rhetoric can have little immediate currency in local communities. On remarks made by then-Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi, Prazak wrote, “Despite the president’s assurance that he would back any girl not wishing to be operated on, the reality of daily life made that assurance an empty gesture.” Whatever one’s opinion, Prazak’s book demonstrates the value and importance of seeing the practice through the perspectives of girls, their families and leaders in their communities.

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FGM – WHEN SCHOOL HOLIDAYS MEAN FGM & “THE CUTTING SEASON”

Photo Series: http://www.unfpa.org/holidayFGM?utm_source=17+August%2C+2017&utm_campaign=2%2F2%2F2017&utm_medium=email

Article: http://www.unfpa.org/cuttingseason?utm_source=17+August%2C+2017&utm_campaign=2%2F2%2F2017&utm_medium=email

By Pilirani Semu-Banda – August 10, 2017

Asha Ali Ibrahim, a local circumciser, with her granddaughter, who is due to be cut this year. © UNFPA/Georgina Goodwin

HARGEISA – Asha Ali Ibrahim, 41, has been performing female genital mutilation (FGM) on girls in Diaami, Hargeisa and other parts of Somalia since 1997. July and August are her busiest months of the year. “This is the peak season, when parents bring their children to be cut,” she told UNFPA.

July, August and September are something of a “cutting season” for many girls around the world, when the break from school means they have time to undergo, and recover from, FGM. Though there is little formally collected data, experts say that FGM is commonly practiced during the school vacation period in parts of Guinea, Nigeria and Somalia.

In some cases, girls even travel from abroad to undergo the procedure. And in some places, it is a precursor to child marriage, which may also take place during school holidays.

FGM is carried out for a variety of reasons. In some places, it is the belief girls must be cut to control their libido. In others, it is the perception that intact girls are dirty or ugly, or that cutting is a prerequisite for marriage. But the practice causes serious medical problems, including haemorrhage, infection, complications in childbirth and even death.

Dangers

About 98 per cent of women and girls in Somalia have undergone some form of FGM, according to a 2011 survey. The most common type involves cutting the genitals then sewing them closed, which can cause significant and long-lasting harm.

Somali girls typically undergo this procedure between ages 7 and 10, but Ms. Ibrahim says girls brought from abroad – especially from the United States and Europe – are usually older, between 12 and 14 years old. “It is a bit cumbersome to carry out the procedure on tissue that is more mature, and the grown up girls struggle more than younger ones,” she said.

Ms. Ibrahim is clear-eyed about some of the dangers. When she took over the role of circumciser from her aging mother, she was motivated in part by a desire to protect girls’ health.

“My mother was using one razor blade on all girls she cut. My daughter got sick soon after being cut by my mother, and I was informed at the hospital that the infection may have occurred from the procedure,” she explained. “I had been understudying my mother, so I asked her to stop carrying out FGM and I took over.”

Ms. Ibrahim says FGM is an important cultural practice. “Circumcision is important as a transition to adulthood,” she told UNFPA. © UNFPA/Georgina Goodwin

Ms. Ibrahim uses one razor blade per client to avoid infections. Her other tools include a small bottle of lidocaine, disposable syringes, balls of cotton wool, raw egg that she says heals the wound, a powdered concoction of traditional herbs and penicillin to prevent infection, a thick white thread to sew up the girls after cutting them, and some methylated spirits for cleaning up. Ms. Ibrahim obtains these supplies over the counter from local pharmacies.

Despite her meticulousness, there have been mishaps. Ms. Ibrahim says she has rushed haemorrhaging girls to hospital. Still, she takes pride in her work, and feels it is an important cultural practice. She denies it causes problems during childbirth.

Her own young granddaughter is due to be cut this season, though the procedure has been postponed. “She’s been unwell recently and I am waiting for her to be better before I circumcise her,” she said.“Circumcision is important as a transition to adulthood. It turns a girl into a woman and this is why all the girls in my homestead have to be circumcised,” she told UNFPA.

“The world is changing”

“Schools are closed for two months between July and August, and this indeed the peak season for FGM,” said Ahmed Jama, a UNFPA specialist working on the issue of FGM. “Girls travel from the West and from Djibouti to be cut here.”

Cibaado Ismail knows all too well the dangers of FGM. Her daughter died in childbirth from complications related to the practice. © UNFPA/Georgina Goodwin

UNFPA partners with the government, health workers, local organizations, as well as religious leaders and youth activists to encourage their community and policymakers to abandon the practice.

The Hargeisa Institute of Health Sciences revised its midwifery curriculum last year, with help from UNFPA, to teach how to manage FGM-related complications that arise during childbirth. The programme also trains future midwives to become advocates for abandoning the practice.

“The world is changing, and Somalis are changing too,” said Nimo Hussain, the institute’s director.

Religious leaders like Sheikh Almis Yahye Ibrahim, 47, are encouraging these changes. The head of International Horn University, he is one of six sheikhs in the Arab region who have formed a network to fight FGM. He also preaches about the harms of FGM to the roughly 5,000 people at the Ibrahim Dheere Mosque.

But the biggest differences will be seen in his daughter’s generation, where girls are increasingly being spared the practice.

None of Sheikh Ibrahim’s three daughters have been cut. “I wouldn’t want to destroy anything about them. They should remain the way Allah created them,” he said.

The biggest changes will be seen in the next generation, as young people take the lead in reevaluating the practice. © UNFPA/Georgina Goodwin

Youth take the lead

Activists in the Y-Peer youth network have also take on the issue.

Pioneered by UNFPA in 2002, Y-Peer trains young people to educate community members about sexual and reproductive health. In Hargeisa, Y-Peer advocates talk to health workers, community members and other young people about a range of topics, including family planning, gender-based violence, child marriage and FGM.

And they have taken the messages to heart.

“I can only marry a girl who is over 18 and is not a victim of FGM,” declared Abdirahman Mohamed, 26, a Y-Peer project officer.

“I wouldn’t marry any girl who has undergone FGM because I don’t want to live with the health complications,” Mustafa Abdirahman, 19, another Y-Peer member, told UNFPA.

Still, these brave youth are the exception. FGM is still widespread, and its negative consequences continue to ravage the lives of women and girls .

Eighty-year-old Cibaado Ismail knows this all too well. She lives in the Rugta camp for internally displaced persons, just outside Hargeisa.

Her daughter died at age 17 of complications during childbirth. The baby also died. Ms. Ismail blames FGM.

“An FGM awareness campaign in the camp helped me understand the negative effects of the practice,” Ms. Ismail said. “I have since banned all my 10 female grandchildren from being cut.”

on, its practice has transformed over time in response to changing circumstances. From Prazak’s book: “. . . this set of rituals is not unchanging and does not follow a primordial mold, even though people connect the acts of today with the practices of their ancestors. Instead, the rituals are a part of people’s lives and are always responsive to the exigencies of everyday life and the various influences on the practice.” In Chapter 4 of her book, Prazak shows how national campaigns against female genital mutilation have spurred dialogue among girls about to undergo genital cutting and how HIV/AIDS awareness campaigns have made alternative forms — particularly medicalized female genital cutting — more acceptable.In some cases, girls decide whether to undergo female genital cutting, but their decisions are made according to a broader context of family desires and community norms. There are two girls featured in Prazak’s book who demonstrate this: Leah Mokami and Janet Robi (names are pseudonyms). Twelve-year-old Leah had decided not to be cut, arguing with “her immediate family that she could become an adult without having her genitals cut.” But as initiation season approached, she faced pressure from her sisters and mother, and she changed her mind. Janet, on the other hand, was supported by her parents in her decision not to undergo genital cutting; her parents protected her from neighbors’ harassment and spoke with extended family to convince them to support Janet’s decision. Her experience suggests there is room for girls to have agency, but Leah’s experience demonstrates the constraints of that agency.The women and girls who are the intended beneficiaries of international advocacy campaigns are the ones who initially face significant costs in foregoing female genital cutting. As Prazak writes, “. . . women who abandon the practice often have a lot to lose: their position in the community is affected, they are less desired as marriage partners. . . . To them, it does not appear that ending female genital cutting will improve their rights and status in the community.”