In “Where Young Women Find Healing and Hope”, New York Times op-ed columnist Nick Kristof presents the story of a relatively new (and largely foreign donor supported) fistula hospital and of one of...
Read More →In Niger, among individuals that value propriety, decorum, and ‘respectful avoidance’, discussions about bodies (even when they are working as they ought to be) are brief, circumspect, and sometimes conspicuously absent. Bodies, particularly...
Read More →As I said at the very beginning of this blog, anthropologists spend months (sometimes years) crafting the perfect project. The most fundable project. But, exigencies in the field often mean that these pieces...
Read More →Over the past decade, obstetric fistula has been effectively branded as a profoundly stigmatizing illness, usually conjuring images of young girls forced into early marriages, “backwards” cultural and religious practices, and victimization by...
Read More →In a recent CNN article ominously (and sensationally) titled “A fate worse than death”, reporter Morgan Windsor describes obstetric fistula as a horrifying condition whereby a sufferer will be “rejected by her husband and...
Read More →Fistula is considered a highly stigmatizing condition – creating social pariahs of young, vulnerable girls victimized by their husbands, their families, their cultures, and a system which fails them. Indeed, this portrait of...
Read More →I like getting what I want. I demand to get what I deserve. I don’t deal well with injustices. I’m told that I’m not good with authority. If I don’t have confidence in...
Read More →Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve heard a lot of chatter about something women call “guriya”. None of my dictionaries are of any use (guriya literally translates as “cotton seed”). Nor are...
Read More →What does it mean to be a Muslim? Is it a self-proclaimed title? Is it acting in accordance with Koranic laws? Is it praying five times a day? Is it cultural? For a...
Read More →I can’t keep a secret for a minute. I give gifts the day I buy them. When I try to hold something back, my face contorts a little, as if the information is...
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