Sheryl WuDunn advocates at MU for women's rights
Thursday is global Human Rights Day.
Published Dec. 10, 2009
Sheryl WuDunn, a Pulitzer prize winning New York Times foreign correspondent and co-author of “Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women World-Wide,” advocated educating and empowering women as the most effective way to bring about change in developing countries on Tuesday night in Waters Auditorium.
“The largest moral challenge of our time is gender inequity,” WuDunn said. “It’s the brutality that so many people in so many different countries face because of their gender. In so much of the developing world, it isn’t so much that your IQ matters in terms of how far ahead you get in school, it’s your gender. It’s your chromosomes.”
WuDunn discussed several examples of women in developing countries who overcame challenges and gave back to their societies. In one such story, a 13-year-old Ethiopian girl suffered a fistula during childbirth, leaving her incontinent. Unable to control her waste, she was ostracized from her village and left in a hut on the outskirts of town to be eaten by hyenas. She managed to escape to the next village and was taken to a hospital that treated her fistula. During her time at the hospital, the doctors were impressed by her intellect and after her recovery employed her as a nurse in the hospital, where she helps treat other women with fistulas.
“The moral of this tale is that women can be taken from victim all the way to very productive assets in society,” WuDunn said. “That’s what’s key, is to see the women as the solution, not as the problem.”
Although WuDunn strongly encouraged the audience to contribute to foreign causes, she admitted foreign aid is not the only solution needed to resolve the issues facing women in developing countries.
“There have been a lot of mistakes made in foreign aid,” she said. “But our take is that doesn’t mean you just throw out the baby with the bath water. We think that you learn from the mistakes and you try and to make it better.”
The lecture and an accompanying book discussion earlier that day by WuDunn were sponsored by the College of Arts and Science and the department of women’s and gender studies.
“The department brought WuDunn to highlight the plight of women and girls around the world and the importance of addressing this plight for the improvement of men and women in the developing world,” department Chairwoman Jackie Litt said.
The lecture was held two days before Human Rights Day, observed annually on Dec. 10 as a celebration of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
“It was a very lucky circumstance that it was,” WuDunn said of the closeness to Human Rights Day. "And I’m glad, because this is just one of the most important human rights issues, the challenge facing so many women and girls around the world."
Central Missouri Stop Human Trafficking Coalition will host a Human Rights Day commemorative event Thursday in Jefferson City. The event features guest speakers and activities to raise awareness of human trafficking and its presence in Missouri.
“As American citizens they have guarantees of a lot of these basic rights built into the Constitution,” Public Health Program faculty member Deb Hume said. “But they need to be aware of what their rights are, what Human Rights are and how to protect those from erosion. And I think that it’s the job of every citizen of the world to be aware of human rights violations around the world.”