When I was growing up in Bangladesh, Burma’s Aung San Suu Kyi never ceased to amaze me. Burma is right next door to us geographically, but as a little girl all I understood about the military junta in Burma was primarily what I learned through pictures. I just could not wrap my head around what kind of […]
Author: Anushay Hossain
Anushay Hossain began her feminist career as an intern at the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) where she worked on microfinance for women and girls in her native country, Bangladesh. A University of Virginia graduate, Anushay joined the Feminist Majority Foundation's Nobel Peace Prize nominated Campaign for Afghan Women before completing her MA in Gender and Development at the University of Sussex. She spent a year at the United Nations Development Fund for Women's (UNIFEM UK) London office before returning to Washington, DC where she invests the majority of her work analyzing the impact of US foreign policy on the health and rights of women and girls around the world.
$5 Million to Address Sexual Violence Against Children—A Drop in PEPFAR’s Bucket?
As the XIX International AIDS Conference draws to a close tomorrow, the United State’s President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) has announced a $5 million grant for the Together for Girls (TFG) partnership–designed to address violence against girls and boys. U.S. Global AIDS coordinator Eric Goosby says funds will go to “support countries’ responses […]
Women’s Rights Key To Effective Global AIDS Response
As the XIX International AIDS Conference proceeds in Washington, D.C., this week, its pertinent to note that a new report by the Global Commission on HIV and the Law, an independent body of former world leaders and top legal, human rights and HIV experts, has labeled the global response to the AIDS epidemic as “stifled” by various […]
Egyptian Women Rally Around “The Girl in the #BlueBra”
This week, the world saw just how brutal the Egyptian military can be towards women who dissent. A video, which has gone viral, shows military police dragging a hijab-clad woman protester through the street, beating her senseless, then stomping on her exposed stomach as she lies motionless in her blue bra. That image has become […]
Peace Unveiled–An Interview with Afghan Women’s Rights Activist Hasina Safi
The next installment of the groundbreaking five-part PBS series Women, War & Peace, airing October 25, takes us to Afghanistan, where women continue their fight to carve out a role for themselves in the country’s future. Peace Unveiled follows the lives of three different Afghan women as they share their hopes, fears and struggles. The Ms. Blog […]
Single Mom Granted Clemency in Ohio
Kelley Williams-Bolar, the Ohio single mother of two who was convicted of a felony for using her father’s address instead of her own in order to get her children into what she felt would be a safer school district, has been granted clemency by Gov. John Kasich. Williams-Bolar had originally been sentenced to 10 days in […]
Accused Rapists Released in Notorious Pakistani Case
It was shocking when Mukhtar Mai was gang-raped by half a dozen men nearly a decade ago, but what surprised the world even more was the courageous decision by this Pakistani woman from the remote village of Meerwala to go public with her rape, breaking a stigma of silence in Pakistan. Mai’s fight for justice […]
Forget the Tea Cups, Think About the Women
Just when you thought there could be no more bad PR for the war in Afghanistan, a crippling 60 Minutes investigation about celebrated author and humanitarian Greg Mortenson’s best-selling works, Three Cups of Tea and Stones Into Schools, has cast doubts not only on the books themselves but on aid organizations in the region. Author […]
My Big Fat Feminist Pregnancy
What has been feminist about my pregnancy? For starters, being in control of my fertility and being able to decide the timing of it. Because such a large part of my job focuses on U.S. foreign policy on global reproductive health and rights, the importance of women being able to access birth control and be […]
Live-Blogging the Women Money Power Summit, Day Two
The Feminist Majority Foundation’s (FMF) annual Women Money Power Summit started off yesterday with a bang and showed no signs of slowing down today. In addition to honoring Nancy Pelosi and Elizabeth Shuler, the first day set forth challenges facing women both here and abroad, from child care to violence against women to global women’s […]