More, Different and Better

The horrific rape of a young female student in New Delhi last December, which sparked mass protests, left myself and work colleagues feeling stunned. Presumably this educated woman, by travelling on a bus, was being too confident? We felt physically sick. And it came so soon after the shooting of 14 year old Pakistani girl Malala, by the Taliban, reportedly for standing up for the right to girls’ education.

Supporting One Billion Rising recently was a way of highlighting our belief that women who become involved in learning are able to take greater control in the face of violence. This is also why we celebrate International Women’s Day each year. In 2011, the centenary of this day, we hosted an event celebrating women and the great strides made for women in education and access to learning in 100 years. Last year, we focussed specifically on the role of adult learning for women in the UK, its central importance in enabling women to succeed in work and life, to enjoy life, to become confident and to make a difference.

And six months ago – on International Literacy Day – we launched an initiative called Women’s Right to Literacy supporting our colleagues in many different countries as they try to help women and girls become literate. The subsequent conference was a delight – we heard about the difference learning to read had made to women’s lives, helping them succeed against the odds. We heard about women who learn to read and then go on to make such a difference in their community and one woman could not believe that she was actually able to vote and that her husband didn’t have to do it for her. It was also upsetting to hear about girls who had never seen a book before.

So, as colleagues and I discussed the distressing stories from India and Pakistan, we talked about the role of learning, and especially literacy, in enabling women to do so much. We also talked about power, and the power of men in stopping them, either personally or through structures and policies, from accessing schooling, learning to read, being equal.  We talked most about how threatened men in those countries must feel when women become literate. How women become powerful and therefore, we assume, men feel less so.

It was only a short step from there to stories from adult education teachers about the situation here in the UK. Women whose husbands wouldn’t allow them to attend courses, who physically dragged them out of classes, who beat them up for reading a book. Or more subtly, by putting women down so they were too scared to attend a class. And then a stream of stories from the Miners’ strike, about women who became literate, got the bug for learning, and then flew.

So leading up to International Women’s Day this year, we’re making the link between campaigning against violence towards women and the role of learning, especially literacy. Whether it’s in the UK, or in Pakistan, in France or in Kenya, literate women are more confident, able to take part in democratic decisions, able to bring up their children to be fulfilled citizens. The blogs last week and scheduled for this week will help us make the case for literacy and learning, and therefore power, for women the world over.