A score for women's voices

Catholic New Times, April 20, 2003 by Rosemary Ganley

On October 15, 2000, I went from Peterborough, Ont. to Ottawa, along with 250 other women, children and men from my city, in order to join 25,000 other Canadians on the Hill for the utterly remarkable, wildly under-estimated World March of Women.

Since that day I have waited for some documentation worthy of this Quebec-organized, global happening to appear--something that would capture both its immediate thrill and power, and offer longer-term analysis of its meaning for the world.

Perhaps the spirit of that day, and similar days, such as the huge gatherings of citizens in Seattle, Quebec City and Porto Alegre, manifested once more in the massive anti-war activities and public demonstrations for peace circling the globe in March.

The triumphant film documentation, A Score for Women's Voices, is that long awaited work.

The 86-minute National Film Board of Canada production, co-produced with Monique and Marcel Simard, has just been released, ready for Canadian women and others to enjoy and study because of its vast implications for global resistance-organizing. Such organizing quietly went on in the two-year lead-up to the World March of Women. National committees in 161 countries mobilized their women's movements--a project of immense energy and commitment.

Here, solid, cross-border relationships formed among women who had ,net each other during the previous ten years at UN world conferences in Rio, Cairo and Beijing. This is the value of "networking," a phenomenon vastly under-esteemed in a patriarchal world.

The idea, the leadership, the fund-raising and the communications for the World March of Women came from the redoubtable president of the Federation des Femmes de Quebec, Francoise David. During the marches end at the United Nations in New York, she greeted and congratulated thousands of women and their supporters who came and bore five million signed cards calling for peace and justice--a presentation to Kofi Annan.

The idea was simple: sometime during the month of October, women were asked to march peacefully on their national legislatures in each country, calling for change. It was a march against poverty and violence, with a special focus on domestic violence. Our pride as Canadians should swell as we watch this video. Quebec women have led once again, as the social movements in that province continue to outstrip anglophone Canada in zeal and relevance. This is probably because they have taken up the world's agenda. They have a sophisticated grasp of the noxious effects of globalization, felt first and most heavily by women and children.

For example, as we anglophone women met up with the surging, joyful, chanting crowds crossing the bridge from Hull that Sunday morning, the Quebecoises chanted: "So, so, so, solidarite; avec des femmes, du monde entier." The "middle-class" issues that we have taken up: legal equality, equal pay, child care, prevention of abuse, fair promotions, access to sexual education and services all are important, all crucial, but now perhaps somewhat too narrow and class-based. It is not easy for the typical Canadian woman to Know me ongoing suffering of the world's grassroots women. This takes effort, imagination and direct experience--global sisterhood.

Such a film goes a long way to bridge the knowledge and compassion gap.

Made by Sophie Bissonnette, with funding from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the Quebec and Canadian Film Corporations, A Score for Women's Voices should have the effect of re- galvanizing the Canadian women's movement, and setting the stage for what is expected to be our participation in the 2005 world meeting of women in Australia. My feeling is that every Canadian woman, who can possibly gather the necessary travel money, should plan to attend at least one global women's conference in her lifetime--one greater than Lourdes, Fatima or Medjugorje, a kind of feminist holy haj that has a sharp and realistic political edge. It is a treat for the soul and it readies the pilgrim for greater, faith-based activism towards a better world.

What Bissonnette has wisely done, in addition to providing dramatic footage of the diversities, colour and passion of the marches in at least 20 countries, is ask five filmmakers in five countries (Senegal, Ecuador, U.S., India and Colombia) to account a creative project affecting women's lives in their countries.

In India, one sees the amazing Nari Adalat courts, by which older community women adjudicate disputes between women and men among the exploited lower castes. In Gujarat, 700 cases in 150 villages have been settled in three years of these community hearings. There is an unforgettable scene of the "judges" arriving, grand-babes motorized bicycle. In a Melbourne segment that drew my tears, the 10-year-old Australian Women's Cir 20 new members each year, ordinary women--no Cirque de Soleil bodies here--who have been sexually abused as children and have as a consequence lost touch with their own bodies and feelings. In warehouses and on piers, the Women's Circus performs its shows: acrobatics, swings, pyramids, dance--all showing the restorative power of healthy, communal physical touch.