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Efforts at guaranteeing gender equality and women's empowerment in Nigeria reached its crescendo with the approval of the National Gender Policy (NGP) in 2006 by the Federal Executive Council, which came into effect in 2007. Objective 5 target (a) of the policy seeks to provide equal opportunities for women [and men] to enjoy and attain an acceptable minimum threshold of universal access to potable water and sanitation, electricity, transportation, and general security of life and property by the year 2015. At present, very few reviews have been done on that policy target. As a result, this paper adopts a literature review approach to review the performance of the NGP with regard to the target in question. Our findings show that the NGP does not offer quantifiable benchmarks for effective evaluation of the target of study, and just as in the pre-NGP era, in the post-NGP era in Nigeria, access to the concerned social services has been inequitable in favour of men, largely as a result of leadership failure in terms of lack of political will to implement the provisions of the NGP, corruption, and administrative lapses as well other social and cultural issues linked to patriarchy, knowledge, research and data limitations. Suggestions for improvement, for example, the non-politicization of women empowerment programmes, special women-alone initiatives, among others, are equally made. Keywords: Access, Gender Policy, Review, Social Services, Women, Nigeria., Introduction The history of development policies in Nigeria has been that of neglect of the gender variable (Federal Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development [FMWASD], 2007). Prior to the [...]

The caste and gender configurations in literary and socio-historic spheres that misrepresent or eliminate Dalit women's voices in mainstream chronicles uphold the notion that caste subjugation has been unresponsively endured by Dalit women. This depiction of the gendered caste subaltern in the mainstream narratives is interrogated and countered by the oral songs of Dalit women in Kerala. This paper examines how the songs as the sites of the register of the voices of Dalit women hold cultural and historic significance carrying the bearings of the Dalit feminist standpoint. The oral songs which contain the feminist consciousness of the gendered caste subaltern in the nascent form provide a lineage to contemporary Dalit feminist writings. Keywords: Dalits, Dalit literature, Dalit oral tradition, Gendered caste subaltern, Caste patriarchy, Dalit feminist standpoint, Subliminal protests., Introduction This inquiry and review of the Dalit oral tradition illuminates the sketching of the literary map of the 'banished' and counters Gayatri Spivak's observation that the subaltern cannot speak [...]

History is a projection of realities from the historian's lens and parameters. The popularity and acceptance of historical accounts depend much on hegemonic structures and knowledge. The Dalit community was marginalized within the Indian economic, social, and political historiography. Gradually, with the rise of Dalit consciousness, men--the better-positioned gender of the community--tried to express their vulnerabilities from a masculinist perspective. The literature written also projected women only as extensions of male protagonists. Though the traumas Dalit women have faced due to intersectional realities are separate from that of men, they could not find a place in early literature as complete entities, entitled to be acknowledged as such. The trade union movements also sidelined the issues of Dalit women laborers. To date, issues of Dalit women's property rights, longevity, education, and empowerment are largely androcentric, as the state's schemes and policies are majorly heteronormative and male centric. The reason why we need to keep invoking the past and history is to assert that the present condition of Dalit women has its roots in the past and their issues and voices continue to remain on the margins despite the rich social experiences they carry and represent. Keywords: Dalit women, Counterpublic, History, Voices, Democracy, India, Introduction History is a projection of realities from the historians' lens and parameters. The popularity and acceptance of historical accounts depend much on hegemonic structures and knowledge. The Dalit community [...]

Feminism meant for empowerment of women has excluded women who are beaten down daily--both physically and mentally--and who lack consciousness, knowledge, and power to change their condition in life--a statement [...]

The urge to empower is a human quality and a multidimensional phenomenon. It allows individuals or groups to participate and prosper in households, communities, and countries through political or development processes. Numerous studies have associated empowerment with many developmental outcomes. In the past decades, significant advances have been made among women in many fields like health, education, and employment. However, increasing incidence of violence against women, under-representation of women in decision-making, discriminatory laws governing marriage, land, property, and inheritance hinder women's empowerment. It is further blocked by new challenges that have emerged over the last decade, such as tackling HIV/AIDS and dealing with trafficking of women and young girls. The present study is an attempt to measure to what extent women in urban Bangalore feel empowered in critical areas such as educational achievement, economic opportunity, health and well-being, decision-making, and autonomy in all matters. The research methodology involved the study of a sample population of women in urban areas of Bangalore City, India. Different women's empowerment indicators were analyzed using a structured questionnaire which was distributed randomly to the female population in urban Bangalore. The main emphasis was on indicators such as women's decision-making power in household affairs, financial autonomy, freedom of movement and access to education. Data analysis revealed that decision-making power in households and freedom of movement of women vary considerably with age, education, and employment. Very few women had the final say on how their earnings were spent. Control over cash earnings increased with age and education. The study also indicates that educational qualifications and access to employment are the essential factors that promote women's empowerment, but the degree of achievement of the goal depends mostly on the attitude of the general population towards gender equality. Keywords: empowerment, education, decision-making, women's autonomy, autonomy, Bangalore, India, women in India, Introduction Empowerment can be represented variously from superficial empowerment (Rosenthal et al., 1997) to a high level of genuine involvement and devolution of power. However, as Ford and Fottler (1995) [...]

Researchers from racial and ethnic groups that are under-represented in US geoscience are the least likely to be offered opportunities to speak at the field's biggest meeting. The people you won't hear from at one of the world's largest scientific meetings Researchers from racial and ethnic groups that are under-represented in US geoscience are the least likely to be offered opportunities to speak at the field's biggest meeting., Author(s): Heather L. Ford, Cameron Brick, Margarita Azmitia, Karine Blaufuss, Petra Dekens Author Affiliations: Women from some under-represented minorities are given too few talks at world's largest Earth-science conference Some [...]

This article examines the evolution of the Afro-descendant women's movement in Peru between 1980 and 2015. We examine the development of women's conscious through other movements, specifically through the national Afro-Peruvian movement and the regional feminist encounters that have been taking place since the 1980s. Our study outlines the tensions, and points of convergence and divergence that have existed for Afro-Peruvian women in these movements. We demonstrate how these issues characterize the nature of Afro-Peruvian women's struggle and their social and political position within the realm of race- and gender-based activism. We show that this friction has prompted women to challenge their institutions and to create spaces for themselves to focus on their own specific needs. First, we trace the Afro-descendant and feminist movements, beginning at the regional level before focusing on the specific case of Peru. Then we outline the different roles that women activists have occupied within the Afro-descendant movement in-country and show how their participation became more visible within their respective organizations and, at times, in the government. Finally, we examine the emergence of a new feminist Afro-Peruvian collective that has served as a locus of cross-organizational dialogue and articulation for veteran and newer activists. The conclusion outlines important current advances involving civil society collectives. The data featured in this paper were collected through extensive archival research, in-depth semi-structured interviews with representatives from the Afro-descendant movements in Peru conducted between 2004 and 2013, and intensive participant observation. Keywords: Afro-descendants, Peru, social activism, women, feminism, race, racism, social movements, participant observation, archival research, Introduction AL FIN AT LAST Y bendigo al cielo porque quiso Dios And I bless the sky because God que negro azabache fuese mi color Wanted my color to be [...]

The Talmud describes conversations in which women addressed questions to the sage R. Eliezer, and his responses seem offensive. This article explains that R. Eliezer used a consistent educational method, [...]