Our project seeks to train women to be citizen journalists able to tell unheard stories and legitimate viewpoints. We will train women to blog and use digital storytelling techniques to highlight issues not reported by the mainstream media. This will result in freedom of expression and the democratisation of the media. We hope to increase women’s voices in the public discourse and confront violence, the denial, blame and stigma surrounding HIV.
Topical focus:
Country:
What locality or neighborhood will your project focus on?
Bulawayo
Describe the specific community with whom you will be working.
We will work with women who have no access to the internet, no skills to use ICTs for social change and are prone to violence. Limited access to information, unequal socio-economic and political status in Zimbabwe is underpinned by discrimination based on sex, patriarchy and gender biases and prejudices. We want suppressed voices to emerge and transcend beyond the limits of conventional media – allowing women to claim their rights.
What kinds of news, stories and other content will be created?
Women will produce digital stories and blog posts that document, raise awareness, challenge and confront human rights abuse in Zimbabwe. Each participant will create a 5-minute digital story. Stories will be screened to the larger community during open dialogue sessions. Stories will also be saved on DVD. A blog will be created, managed and maintained by women during and after project period. Other social media will be used to share stories.
What technologies and digital tools do you plan to use in the trainings?
Other tools
N/A
Describe the connections that you or your organization have already established that will contribute to the success of the project.
We are a member of the GBV Prevention network which connects us to member organisations in Africa. It provides materials which we use in our trainings and campaigns. We have partnership agreements with a local church, Noah’s Ark Ministries. The church helps us to mobilise target beneficiaries at grassroots level. We have been trained by World Pulse (www.pulsewire.com) in citizen journalism and web 2.0.
How many participants do you think will be involved in your project?
We plan to train 50 women. Our engagement and communication plan seeks and sustains women’s participants through quarterly meetings; project brochures; SMS sent to women weekly by project staff; community dialogues organised and facilitated by the community working closely with programme team, website and newsletters.
Besides the microgrant funding, what other resources and support are you seeking for your project to ensure its success?
We request networking support which will enable us to link women’s voices on the “superhighway” across the globe. We also request additional information and training materials on citizen media to improve the quality of our trainings. This information will be used by the community and accessed from our resource centre open to target population.
Contact name
Gertrude Pswarayi
Organization
Creative Centre for Communication and Development