Women's History Month Events

March 18:
Presidential Achievement Awards for Women Students.
2 p.m., Dickson Hall, Room 178.

"Women, Peace and Patriotism: Jane Addams and Lucia Ames Mead on Kant's Theory of Perpetual Peace," a lecture by Dorothy Rogers, of Humanities and Social Sciences. 7-9 p.m., Dickson Hall, Room 178.

March 19:
"Latinas' Emerging Voices in Our Political Arena." with Assemblywoman Nelly Pou. 12:30- 2 p.m., Student Center, Rooms 411-414.

March 21:
"Women as Political Prisoners: International Perspectives," a dialogue with Nawal El Saadawi, visiting distinguished Scholar, and Lidia Falcon. 3-4:30 p.m., Dickson Hall, Room 178.

March 26:
Women's Chocolate and Song: Third Annual Women’s Coffeehouse. 7-10 p.m., Student Center Rathskeller.

March 27:
The Liberation of Women Through Islam. 2-5 p.m., Student Center Ballrooms.

"I, Unseen," an original play by Marika Mashburn
7-9 p.m., Webster Hall.

In celebration of Women's History Month, Women's Studies is hosting a series of lectures by prominent female activists, performers and scholars. One event will feature two supporters of the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), Anne Brodsky and Alicia Lucksted.

The pair will give a talk, "Revisiting Afghanistan Post-Taliban," Monday, March 25 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. in Dickson Hall, Room 178.

"I think it's important that we hear what these women have to say. We need to keep in mind that there is a lot going on in Afghanistan other than American military action and the information supplied by the mass media," said Carla Petievich of History, chair of Women’s Studies.

RAWA was established in 1977 in Kabul as a political and social organization of Afghan women. Gaining equal rights and social justice for women while fighting for a government based on democracy was the main objective of the organization. RAWA also fought against political occupation in Afghanistan. When the Taliban came into power, women and girls were forbidden to hold jobs, receive health care or go to school. Knowing the dangers they faced during the rule of the Taliban, RAWA went underground to secretly devise plans to help assist oppressed Afghan women with the health care and education they desperately needed.

Fawzia Afzal-Khan of English has been active in the Pakistani Women's Movement, which has worked in connection with RAWA. "I found out about RAWA after 9-11 when the world focus was on Afghanistan," she said. After hearing a RAWA supporter speak, Afzal-Khan set the wheels in motion to get Brodsky and Lucksted to speak on campus.

Brodsky, an assistant professor of psychology and women's studies at the University of Maryland, and Lucksted, from the Center for Mental Health Services Research at the University of Maryland, are the northeast leaders of U.S. Supporters of RAWA, an organization founded in America that focuses on fund-raising for the RAWA cause. Brodsky, who recently returned from a month-long trip to Afghanistan and Pakistan, will speak about the latest activities occurring in that area. (To read an article by Brodsky that appeared in the Sept. 24, 2001 Washington Post, titled "The Taliban's Victims," click here.) Her lecture will include what is happening to the women in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban and what the future holds for them.

"We are delighted they are coming," Afzal-Khan said. "It is important to challenge the stereotype of the poor, victimized Afghan woman that exists in this country. We have to salute the strength of Afghan women."

Petievich agrees on the importance of this event. "While there are currently no Afghan RAWA members in the United States because they are all engaged in Afghanistan, and the refugee camps in Pakistan and elsewhere, the two people coming to speak to us are in close communication with RAWA in South Asia and can give us reliable information," she said.

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