Saharla Ismail, Community Team Assistant
International Women's Week saw a programme of events spread between 4 - 9 March, with the aim to celebrate creative expression from women and to fundraise for local charities.
The planning process for International Women’s Week began in January with a meeting with students from various societies, such as Amnesty International, UWE Feminist Society and Woman’s Talk.
We came up with a programme that had six events spread between 4 – 9 March, with the aim to celebrate creative expression from women and to fundraise for local charities.
The first event was a period themed Quiz at The Students’ Union Bar, which was organised by the Feminist Society (FemSoc).
Here, FemSoc challenged the taboos of menstruation, allowing women to have a conversation about their body and taking ownership of it.
This event raised £99.62 for No More Taboo, a local charity that raise awareness for period poverty.
This Hijabi Says was inspired by Hijabi Monologues. Shagufta Iqbal facilitated the workshops on behalf of the Diverse Artist Network. The workshops happened over the course of a weekend that was two weeks prior to the performance.
In the workshop, we did a range of activities that helped shape our poem for the performance. This was done through a range of writing exercises, such as the popular story completion game and sharing your story with someone in the group who would then have to write your story as you.
The idea of Jamesty came from UWE’s Amnesty International Society. Jamnesty was an open mic night celebrating incredibly talented women, where acts ranged from singers to poets.
This was a fundraising event for Amnesty and raised £55.86.
Lady Lazarus exhibition was an art exhibition celebrating women and non-binary creatives of UWE and the wider Bristol community. This was curated by Fine Art students, Courtenay Welcome and Kiara Corales. The exhibition took unconventional standards of beauty and bought them to the light. It was so refreshing to see different body types on display.
Women’s Talk had Camille Barton host a workshop on Consent and Asserting Boundaries which was really insightful. There are many parts of consent that people don’t typically consider as consent, but which all fall under asserting boundaries. This was an interesting and eye opening event about something which is very topical at the moment.
The final event was a vulva cake decorating workshop with poetry and a playlist. The event ended the week on a high, with a warm atmosphere and a diverse group of people – there was a real sense of unity and respect.