It is well recognized that women are widely attributable to contributing towards creating a more cohesive community as they have almost all the time spent, no mandatory of course, with the new generation, the next posterity, and their sympathetic gesture is accredited to the path in creating civic-minded and peace-loving citizens.
Keeping this in mind, The Ethiopian Herald approached Meskerem Balcha, a gender specialist, graduated from Addis Ababa University in Gender studies and works for an organization as a gender consultant.
She said, “The role of women in boosting the development of Ethiopia should never be underestimated. They are indispensable in the national development and integration of any issue. National cohesion and integration in the country is an enabling process to all citizens to have a feeling that they are members of the same nation engaged in a common enterprise, facing shared challenges and opportunities.”
However, she said women are often excluded from decision-making processes, and their perspectives have not yet always been taken into account. There is a need for greater recognition of women’s roles in promoting social cohesion, peace, and conflict resolution, and for their full participation in decision-making processes.
According to Meskerem, women can play a great role in promoting national cohesion and integration for sustainable development in Ethiopia. While some women benefit from emerging opportunities nationally, Ethiopia with traditional gender roles suffers from increased burdens and stress, and hence their efforts towards nation-building should not be curtailed. Women also need to partner with key allies in order to spearhead debates on the removal of retrogressive cultural practices and norms that hinder them from achieving their national agenda.
“In peace building and national integration initiatives, women need not be excluded. Since women’s level of contribution in peace processes remains one of the most unfulfilled aspects, they have to be well promoted via making their unreserved contribution to the effort geared towards peace and tranquility. Women participation in different roles in cultural promotion, generational nurturing, and peace-building at the household, community, and national levels is really immense. Their substantial contributions to peace, family and social unity, as well as community survival are not necessarily recognized at the political level,” she said.
While improvements have been made, women remain underrepresented in public offices, at the negotiating table she said adding that the needs and perspectives of women are often overlooked in post conflict disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration, as well as in security sector reform, rehabilitation of justice, and the rule of law.
Many conflicts have been marked by widespread sexual and gender-based violence, which often continues in the aftermath of war and is typically accompanied by impunity of the perpetrators, she added.
There is a need to coordinate and focus on mechanisms of preventing full-scale violent conflicts by closely watching and reading the signs of conflicts. By so doing, women need to capitalize on their networks as well as the capacity to stop violent conflicts even before they happen, start peace-building before violence erupts, and use their numbers to transform situations of conflict. It is important to pay particular attention and involve young people and women in issues of social justice and especially conflict resolution mechanisms for the sake of boosting social cohesion, she opined.
As to her, it is important to equip women with the necessary skills to get involved in conflict resolution mechanisms such as negotiation, mediation, and arbitration. There is also a need for greater women’s participation in decision-making processes by providing ethical leadership that takes into consideration the social justice realities of the nation. There is additionally a need to form well-coordinated and mutually enriching networks within the women organizations of regional states and Ethiopia as a whole and strengthen the regional movement and make far-reaching contributions to the global network of women, making marks in social cohesion, amity, reconciliation, justice and peace paradigms.
Yes, women frequently incorporate new forms and techniques with the traditional to preserve and pass on these kinds of intangible culture, so renewing culture Meskerem said adding women’s creativity is also necessary for the survival and revitalization of intangible cultural manifestations.
As learnt from Meskerem, women have a crucial role in the global preservation and vitality of cultural diversity and history. Their responsibilities in connection to intangible heritage are particularly important because they contain what may be called core regions and representations of cultural heritage, which are usually necessary for the maintenance of cultural identity.
Women have been one of the priority groups of cultural preservation. They renew and modify culture through preserving and passing on intangible culture to future generations. Furthermore, the involvement of women in the preservation of intangible assets, particularly in local cultural contexts, is critical to the preservation of cultural variety, she added.
Honestly speaking, women make up around half of the population of any given country. They have played significant roles in the evolution of civilization in developing countries like ours. As wives, women are responsible for the well-being of the whole home, including extended family members.
Women often decline to do what they could do to follow the ideas of culture and tradition. They should not be subjected to gender-specific limitations in cultural sites. Women’s contributions to the transfer of intangible cultural heritages and posterity building are critical in today’s reality. Intangible heritage, also known as immaterial legacy, refers to components of citizens’ lives that are critical to the continuation and expression of cultural identity among the generation, Meskerem underscored.
She further stated that essential areas of culture, as well as those that are frequently necessary in preserving familial and cohesive social relationships, are examples of these spheres. Many of these key kinds of intangible heritage are transmitted and renewed intergeneration allies in most cultures via the raising of children.
“Gender inequality is prevalent in many cultures; hence the topic of women’s empowerment and gender equality is high on everyone’s mind. Women are also caretakers of intangible cultural legacy, which includes the performing arts, such as music, art and handicrafts, weaving, textiles, and the know-how for the construction of material culture, among other things. Women frequently incorporate new forms and techniques with the traditional to preserve and pass on these kinds of intangible culture, so renewing culture,” said Meskerem.
According to Meskerem, women’s creativity is also necessary for the survival and revitalization of intangible cultural manifestations. Many female artists produce works of traditional value while combining modern aspects in performance, such as theatre and dance. This is a valuable contribution that should be recognized. Women transmit intangible legacy in ways that are adaptable to modern situations, inclusive of change, and improve cultural representations via their passion for their work.
Women embark on agricultural activities for a variety of reasons, too. They have personal interests, they earn financial resources and it is the family tradition.
The involvement of women in agriculture in Ethiopia has attracted greater attention in recent years. The reasons for their involvement are numerous and diverse. In some areas of Ethiopia, women have virtually taken on in the production and processing of arable crops, being responsible for as much as 60 percent of the staple food production, she added. If given the opportunity, women can effectively participate in policy-making and governance especially as it affects their cultural heritage. Women have an important role to play in ensuring the enjoyment of rights in a violence-free environment for women and girls. Decision-making by women in the family and community context is usually respected and supported by various cultural values and practices.
Cultural institutions need to re-educate their constituencies about the existence and significance of the positive cultural values, norms, and practices, as identified by this project.
Obviously, said Meskerem, in the country, women are active agents in the arena of food and rituals keeping alive modes of worship, fasts and festivals and rules governing concerns of purity and pollution. Although these reinforce and reproduce the boundaries of caste and class they also provide avenues of self–worth and expression through the command of the repertoire of rules and of innovation and subversion.
Although these sometimes elicit ambivalent responses on the part of state and religious authorities, they nonetheless exhibit tremendous resilience. Many areas of women’s knowledge and practice, which are at the heart of intangible cultural heritage, risk becoming marginalized with increasing globalization of production, exchange and the transmission of knowledge. It is therefore an urgent priority to document women’s existing roles in the transmission of cultural heritage and to explore areas of both conflict and synergy with increasing globalization, Meskerem opined.
Women’s networks are frequently multi-functional and may involve self-help, ritual, and artistic forms of expression. They involve elements of innovation as well as the transmission of local cultural practices to the next generation. They may also mobilize local cultural forms and resources in their search for greater equality. Intangible cultural heritage may act not only as a resource for development but also for the empowerment of women.
BY MENGESHA AMARE
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD THURSDAY 26 DECEMBER 2024
