By LINDSEY SCHIBELHUT, Staff Reporter.
The changing world of gender was the topic at the most recent Brown Bag series “Journeying to India and Beyond.” Professor of English, Chey Davis and professor of Biology, Dr. Wendy Baker spoke about their trip to India on March 18. They shared their photos and experiences with the 2014 Women’s World Congress and how it’s shedding light on women’s rights around the globe.
The 2014 Women’s World Congress was held in Hyderabad, India and happens every three years. The conference began in 1981 according to Davis.
“One of the interesting things that I learned,” says Davis, “[was that] there is a great distinction obviously between how we live our lives here in the United States and how other people live their lives in India.”
There were over 700 different presentations going on at the conference. Many of the discussions going on were about how to prevent rape on a mass scale, and many of the presenters were Indian women.
“If you go to work you could be raped. Wearing jeans, having a cell phone or listening to western music, having a job, could get you raped,” says Davis.
Another one of the big issues that stood out to Davis during the discussions is that in Hyderabad 40 percent of India lives under the level of poverty for the country. It was really noticeable in the Delhi area as well.
“[It] basically means they don’t have homes,” says Biology Professor Wendy Baker, “they are homeless.”
They also explained how there is still a habit and an expectation of a dowry, so if you have children you have to pay for them to be married. One story they told was of two brothers who had to go to the bank for a dowry loan for their sister because their father had died.
“One of our friends who was our guide in the beginning,” Davis says, “he and his brother had to pay 2 million rupees (approx. $30,000 in US dollars) for his sister and went into debt. He was looking forward to getting married, but he had to pay off his sister’s debt because he felt overburdened with that particular cost.”
Jazz Jasper, a student was in attendance, says, “Overall it was a great presentation. I learned that women don’t have certain rights and can’t go anywhere without feeling like they are going to be raped, it’s sad.”
During the event Baker and Davis showed photos of the local people they met, even showing a piece of hand-woven silk they found at a market. Photos were shared of the sites they visited during their trip. Some of those sites included the Taj Mahal, the Mahatma Ghandi Memorial, the Sisters of Mercy Orphanage and the National Wildlife Refuge, among others.
But most of all Baker hopes the presentation will awaken people to the plights of others around the world.
“I hope people took away a conscience of what some of the issues around the world are and how we can be a solution to some of these problems.”
