Violence Against Women and Girls on the Increase in Cambodia

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7747314.stm

Call for proposals from potential beneficiaries!

Hello!

Phnom Penh is proud to be a participant in the 2009 V-Day Campaign. We have been granted the rights for a V-Day production of The Vagina Monologues to raise money and awareness for local organizations that work to stop violence against women and girls. The play will be performed in February 2009.

In 2008, over 4000 V-Day benefit events took place, produced by volunteer activists in 120 countries around the world, educating millions of people about the reality of violence against women and girls both locally and globally. In 2009 Phnom Penh will be one of thousands of events around the world channeling their creative energy into making a difference as part of the V-Day Campaign. It is our intention to make V-Day 2009 Phnom Penh a huge success, and we are considering your organization as a potential beneficiary of our event.

Part of what makes this event so special is the opportunities it offers to organizations like yours - to participate in this global movement, to celebrate and honor the women and girls in our community, to educate our community about your important work, to be part of a collective voice, a voice that refuses to be ignored, a voice that says NO to violence against women and girls.

We will be donating all profits from our event to one local organisation working to stop violence against women and girls and we are offering you an opportunity to be that organisation. But we want to do more than just give you money; we want to include you in our event in as many ways as you want to be involved, from speaking to us and our audience about your work, to having an information table at our event, to helping us plan, to inviting your staff and supporters to attend our event, and so much more. There is so much that we can do together!

In addition to receiving money from our event, as a beneficiary of V-Day 2009 Phnom Penh, your organisation’s name will appear in our promotional and publicity materials and in our performance program.

To enable us to choose one beneficiary, from the many organizations working to eliminate violence against women in Cambodia, we would appreciate it if you could fill in the attached questionnaire, and return it to us by December 10th. Should you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us. E-mail: cambodianmonologues@gmail.com

Questionnaire:

1. What is your organisation doing to stop violence against women and girls?
2. What are the main obstacles you face in your work?
3. What have you achieved/succeeded in so far?
4. Who funds you, and are you adequately funded for the year 2009?
5. What would you be able to achieve with a small grant ($2,000-$5,000)?

Introduction

The Vagina Monologues by Eve Ensler will be performed for only the second time ever in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in February 2009. Parallel to producing and staging the play, the production team has started a 'parallel process' of workshops involving Cambodian women, of which more below.

For more information about The Vagina Monologues and the V-Day Movement, of which the Phnom Penh production is a part, please see http://www.vday.com/.

The TVM Phnom Penh 2009 production is a charity event raising money for an organisation or group working to end violence against women and girls in Cambodia.

Background:

The play The Vagina Monologues (TVM) by Eve Ensler was first performed in Phnom Penh in October 2005 to wide acclaim, albeit with an all expatriate cast and largely expatriate audience too. The production team behind the TVM Phnom Penh 2009 production, which is part of the official V-Day Campaign (www.vday.com), decided it would be important and valuable to reach out to the local community too and include Cambodian women in the project. Recognising that the subject matter of the play is largely taboo and even controversial in Cambodian society, the team decided to launch a process parallel to the production of the play to introduce ideas arising from the play to local women. The starting point was to thus create opportunities for Cambodians to take part in the TVM process, without them necessarily performing the play itself if they did not feel comfortable doing so.

Goal:

Begin a process of compiling articulations of what it means to be a woman in a woman’s body in contemporary Cambodia parallel to (and potentially going beyond) the TVM Phnom Penh 2009 production.


Activities:

Workshops for Cambodian women in a confidential, secure and comfortable environment discussing issues related to women in Cambodia

Private interviews where individual women’s stories are documented

Production of a booklet/book featuring information on violence against women in Cambodia, as well as Cambodian women’s ‘monologues’ (similarly to the play)

Create a blog documenting the process and enabling more people access to the ideas underlying the project

Film screenings of Until the Violence Ends to highlight the international reach of the play and how violence against women is a global problem

Mission:

Encourage a mentality as well as create a space and environment in which a dialogue on what it means to be a woman in a woman’s body in Cambodia is possible

Vision:

A society in which issues surrounding the female body and female sexuality can be discussed and explored

Values:

Confidentiality: All activities are conducted confidentially; no stories or personal information shared shall be discussed or published outside of the activities (without explicit permission)

Anonymity: Any published stories will be published anonymously, and only with the permissionof the participant

Acceptance: There can be no right or wrong in a woman’s experience

Respect: Members of the opposite sex are not adversaries and shall be treated with respect