Echoes of Women’s Voices: For a Virtual Museum
Imilchil, Merzouga, Al Hoceima Marrakesh – Rabat…
From January 2023 to the end of March 2023
Echoes of the Voices of Women being Victims of Violence and Grave Violations of Human Rights: for a Virtual Museum
Inpartnershipwiththeassociation:“Relais:Prison–Society”andlocalandregionalassociationsandunderthesupportoftheNationalHumanRightsCouncilin:Imilchil,Merzouga,AlHoceima,MarrakechandRabat,fromDecember2022totheendofMarch2023
“TheHumanRightsCenterforMemoryandArchive”isorganizing“CaravanDakira”underthetheme:Weareback,let’sstart…
Ontheissue:“Womenwhoarevictimsofviolenceandgraveviolationsofhumanrights:foravirtualmuseum”
Inthiscontext,preserving memory has become of global importance since the emergence of transitional justice experiences in many countries in South America, Africa and Asia (…) to express the need to preserve the memory of the victims of grave violations. Doing so is a way to show reality, highlight the damages, enable all parties in the state and society to reconcile with the self as well as history, and thus to achieve substantive knowledge capable of supporting the process of total respect for human rights and the reinforcement of democratic values.
Actually, collective and individual memory has emerged in the global philosophical, legal, political and cultural sphere since the mid-twentieth century, following the Second World War that occurred in the twentieth century right after the Holocaust and the serious violations of humanitarian norms, human rights values and international humanitarian law.
Since then, the use of painful memory questions has extended to all regions and peoples around the world, and as a result most societies were obliged to return to their history, recalling the Holocaust (e.g. the Nazi Holocaust) or the violence of colonial domination and enslavement of the peoples of Africa, America and Asia… It even extended to crimes of grave violations of human rights under tyrannical and dictatorial regimes, including political and social violence against women.
This path has achieved international institutional legislation. In this regard, The UN General Assembly has issued resolutions and legislation, including the resolution issued on December 18, 2013 (item ten) that aims at encouraging countries that have not yet developed a national policy for archives guaranteeing the preservation and protection of all archives related to human rights and the legislation of a law providing for the preservation of the documentary heritage of the nation…
One should also appreciate the efforts being made by the Human Rights Council, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, UNESCO and other international non-governmental bodies.
As for the national level, many signs show how all are involved in this path. In fact, the Moroccan experience of transitional justice was launched through creating the “equity and reconciliation commission” (April 30, 2004 – November 30 2005) based on the demands of the victims and the general human rights movement on the one hand, and in regard to the requirements of the democratic transition in the country on the other hand. In this respect, this path has been agreed upon by most of the political components in the state and society…
After the Moroccan experience in transitional justice, the Moroccan legal and cultural sphere has promoted many artistic and literary expressions and testimonies as a way to highlight the memories of the victims and events related to the years of lead in Morocco. Accordingly, this represents an explicit call to rewrite history based on such events and memories.
In this respect, the Equity and Reconciliation Commission has adopted the gender approach as an option that includes all areas of its intervention by eliciting women’s testimonies in public hearings, and monitoring the violations to which women were subjected in their lives . Such violations negatively affect the woman’s personality physically, morally and socially, causing damage to her gender identity, while leading to the cohesion of the society to which she belongs. Therefore, this commission has established a gender approach to preserve the memory of women who have been subjected to abuse, marginalization and forgetfulness.
Accordingly, the arbitrary detention and arrest of women represents a form of state institutional violence against women as being the social group most vulnerable to oppression. It is worth noting that violence increases more in the spatial arrangements of prisons, which may represent institutional policies of the state.
Prisons, as a closed and violent spatial space, is another form of normative violence that is based on social discrimination.
Since violence against women, as a serious violation of human rights, is linked to both political power and social authority based on the traditional patriarchal system, a large part of the memory of women being victims of violence could be subject to marginalization and forgetfulness. Generally, self-expression and blogging remained dominated by men. Indeed, sings of this domination increases even more in the context of prevailing patriarchy and oppressive patriarchal thought, especially when this thought is framed within a broader and comprehensive context, which is the context of state and society violence (patriarchy).
As long as valorizing the memory of women who are victims of grave violations of human rights represents a major element of the individual and collective reparation procedures for the victims, it seems obvious that this valorization may constitute a driving force for change in the lives of the victims, and a mechanism for transforming the path of transition from the status of inequality based on gender to establishing balance and justice in social structures and relations in the field of gender equality. Valorizing the memory of women who are victims of grave violations of human rights is therefore of immense importance due to its impact on female victims as well as the successive generations of both sexes through the participation of women in public or private life or through fighting the grave violations that had an impact not only on women, but also on the successive generations of both sexes.
In this regard, and according to the Moroccan constitution (2011), especially its preamble and chapters number 6, 25, 26, 31, 33 and 161, we evoke the importance of valorizing and preserving women’s memories so as to shed light on the sufferings of women who were victims of violence and serious violations of human rights, and also to practically contribute to establishing local or human, physical or virtual sites of conscience and memory by involving the successive generations in learning from the previous lessons.
Attheapproachlevel
Adopting the human rights methodology in educational and awareness-raising methods that shall guarantee objectivity and can be activated and implemented at the levels of human rights and democracy;
Adopting a methodology that supports young generations from various segments and areas by making them open to national and international experiences in the same field;
Relying on the elements of the Moroccan experience in transitional justice in valorizing the memory of victims in general and female victims in particular, given that their voices have always been ignored.
Considering that preserving the memory of women being victims of violence and grave violations of human rights is a factor for the advancement of collective memory as a whole, and of Moroccan history as well.
Contributing to empowering successive generations to recognize the obstacles that have come from previous frustrations, and engaging in paths of respecting citizenship and national identity in the hope of reaching a bright future in which human dignity is preserved and the values of democracy and social justice are maintained.
Developing an integrated plan to preserve memory based on educational foundations in which coordination and cooperation are established between civil society actors and national institutions concerned with human rights and culture. The plan could also be fruitful in terms of opening up to comparative international experiences in the fields of transitional justice and other experiences concerned with establishing, rehabilitating and managing museums and sites of memory and conscience.
Attheprocedurallevel;
- The project is based on organizing “Caravan Dakira”, consisting of art exhibitions of women’s portraits, along with presentations and training, awareness and educational workshops.
- The ‘Caravan Dakira’ will visit different cities: Imlilchil, Merzouga, Al Hoceima, Marrakech and then Rabat.
- Its activities last for at least three days
- The samples of the presented portraits are of women who represent the echoes of those who were directly or indirectly victims of violence and grave violations of human rights.
- Echoes of the memory of women from the Atlas Mountains (the events of Moulay Bouazza)
- Echoes of the memory of women from the Rif Mountains
- Echoes of women’s memory from the Years of Lead
- Echoes of the memory of leading women, as part of the movements of the families of political prisoners
- Echoes of women’s memory
- ‘Caravan Dakira’ is targeting young people (25 participants) through adopting participatory and interactive approaches (the peer education approach) due to their effective role in horizontal learning and the investment they allow for strengthening and developing young people’s experiences and skills. ‘Caravan Dakira’ also aims at encouraging and motivating young people to engage in discussion of societal and human rights issues along with involving them in the production of sensitization and awareness-raising mechanisms in preserving memory, advancing human rights and reinforcing the values of justice, equity, reconciliation and peace.
- A group of male and female trainers experienced in the subject guides the activities of the ‘Caravan Dakira’ and valorizes the memory of women concerned by presenting artistic portraits, testimonies, narratives and aesthetic expressions as a basis for dialogue between the participants and for understanding the past, which allows for rehabilitating of the present while building a future based on human dignity.
- ‘Caravan Dakira’ seeks to enable the target groups to make good use of the artistic image, oral and written testimony, and the legal and human rights text. It also aspires to properly adopt digital technologies and social media in the exploration and monitoring of women’s memories and related symbolic sites.
- ‘Caravan Dakira’ aims at contributing to the establishment of local museums in the hope of establishing a virtual museum that embraces all women who have been subjected to grave violations of human rights along the national, regional and global map.
- The activities of ‘Caravan Dakira’ seek to produce educational, awareness-raising and aesthetic aspects aiming at creating local museums or a virtual digital museum that is directed to the general public.
For those interested, media professionals and followers, the Human Rights Center for Memory and Archive provides the following addresses:
www.dakira.org
Fatna EL BOUIH: fatna.elb@gmail.com
Tel: 0661 85 33 03
Mohamed El KHAMLICHI: m.elkhamlichi@gmail.com
Tel: 0624 30 20 22