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Women: International
tion and gender are key components of
their mandate.
To cater to the needs of African
women in community radio, the
Women’s International Network (WIN)
of the Africa section of the World Association
of Community Radio Broadcasters
(AMARC) has developed a training
program aimed at improving the
technical and editorial capacities of
women. This editorial training introduces
them to gender analysis and to
the tools they’ll need to link themselves
with various women’s organizations.
This creates a bottom-up, localto-national
flow of information and
improves advocacy on gender. The
training on technologies teaches them
to use radio as a bridge to the Internet,
again by supplying tools to feed their
productions into a community radio
exchange that reaches across Africa.
The potential of such a communityto-community
exchange to articulate,
legitimize and catalyze African women’s
mobilization for change is enormous.
The impact of changes and initiatives
on the gender agenda is slowly but
cumulatively building and being felt.
When we can turn on our radio stations
and hear about what rural women
in the Sahel are doing about desertification
and be able to immediately contrast
that with the experience of similar
women in the Horn—or when we can
listen to the voices of women involved
in conflict resolution from Sierra Leone
to Rwanda to Somalia—then we’ll know
we’re getting somewhere. ■
L. Muthoni Wanyeki is the executive
director of the African Women’s
Development and Communication
Network (FEMNET) and president of
the World Association of Community
Broadcasters (AMARC Africa).
femnet@africaonline.co.ke
media work hard to find ways for community
members to participate in production
of the news. Because of this,
news coverage is mainly based on information
deemed relevant by news
broadcasters and the communities that
they serve. Even though women form
the majority of radio listeners, men still
dictate what is listened to. Knowing
this, the attitude in newsrooms remains
very traditional and male dominated.
AMARC Africa—through its Women’s
Program—works with women in community
radio to help empower them
through training and other developmental
programs. [See accompanying
story by L. Muthoni Wanyeki about
these training programs.]
When women are the subjects of
news coverage, they are usually considered
to be among the influential
and powerful people in the society,
such as cabinet ministers, members of
Parliament (if they are vocal, otherwise
they are not much noticed), high office
officials, women married to important
men, and beauty queens. Ordinary
women only are considered news when
something they’ve done is “bad” or
when they do something more than
“extraordinary.” There is little connection
between women being in high
places in the media and the coverage
women, in general, receive. News coverage
of women is more closely linked
to an individual woman’s social status.
Are there ways to make things better,
both for women who work in media
as well as for coverage of issues of
importance in women’s lives? AMARC
is working with other stakeholders to
urge those in positions of power within
the media in Africa to operate genderbalanced
management systems, programming
and employment practices
that oppose discrimination and that
are open and accountable to all. Women
in the media are also advised to advocate
for gender and communication
policies in their countries and to use
lobbying, networking, training and research
to fight for their equal representation
and coverage of women’s lives.
Women journalists are being encouraged
to become more active in their
efforts to report stories with more realistic
and positive portrayals of women.
For instance, instead of covering violence
against women in such a way that
portrays women only as victims, coverage
can focus on ways to alleviate this
violence and also report on the perpetrator.
And the few successful women
in the media should work towards encouraging
and supporting others.
These women could start by joining
and actively participating in women’s
media associations whose main objective
is to empower and raise the standards
of women in the media. ■
Khayelitsha township, Cape Town. Photo
by Monica Bekwapi.
Lettie Longwe is women’s program
officer for AMARC Africa, a regional
office for AMARC, an international
non-governmental organization that
serves the community radio movement
on five continents.
winafrica@global.co.za
Nieman Reports / Winter 2001 77