BOOK REVIEW: WOMEN EMPOWERED SAY NO TO FGM

WOMEN EMPOWERED: INSPIRING CHANGE IN THE EMERGING WORLD

Phil Borges

Rizzoli

In the introduction to this handsome book, Madeleine Albright says, “This is a book about hope, based on reality.” It surely is exactly that.  

Borges’ photographs of women (and a few men) living in mostly impoverished villages in several parts of the globe show people who are nevertheless rich in spirit. They are rich in courage, and the capacity to innovate. The stories related in Women Empowered are short, some little more than snippets. But those snippets introduce readers to women whose courageous acts make us say, “That’s incredible!”

I’m tempted to describe each women’s experience here, but will settle for just one that seems too amazing to be true, yet I believe it.

When Abay was eleven years old, she ran away from her Ethiopian village when her mother insisted she follow the custom of being circumcised. Abay found shelter with a relative and eight years later returned. After another five years she persuaded a woman to let her photograph a circumcision ceremony, and then somehow got a committee of elders to watch it. Horrified, they called a special meeting, and after a vote of fifteen to one, they banned the ceremony.

One elder said, “Now that I have seen this film, I could never let my granddaughter go through this ceremony.” A woman who had performed the ceremonies hundreds of times, now supports the change. She says, “We did the circumcisions because that is what had always been done. we were in the dark house and did not know.”

“Abay’s story” no longer belongs just to her. The ramifications are wide and not all of them are cited here. There are many more stories in this beautiful book, and each shoes the power of one person and her or his supporters changing the world.

Anyone who longs for a lift in her spirits will find it in this book.