Malaysia Before Malaysia Lecture #5- Conversation on Stories of Malayan Women will be organized at Pusat Rakyat LoyarBurok on 22nd October 2016 (Saturday).
* For more information, please visit this website https://www.facebook.com/events/632065066971916/
Over the last decade, there has been a newly emerging trend to rewrite the history of our past with a special attention to the role of women and their achievements- a dimension often neglected in the mainstream historical writings. Inspired directly or indirectly by the rise of feminist movements across the world, the new generation of historians have began to revisit archival materials to locate and narrate the lives of ordinary women in various historical period. The began to ask: why the histories of war, education, art, movements , politics, religion and culture are based merely on the other experiences of men? Where can one locate the voice of women in all of these categories? And perhaps, can a history on women move beyond the story of queens and mistresses and start paying more attention to women of different class and races?
In Malaysia, unfortunately, not much has been done to fill in the large gap of history which predominantly centred around men. For example, one can find very few literatures on the role of radical women's movement who struggled alongside their male comrades at the height of fighting for Malayan independece. Such historical oversight tend to lend credence to the master-narrative that depicts men as prime movers of great events while women were perceived as mere auxiliaries in the making of an independent nation-state. This, then, subconsciously imprint into the mind of younger generation that women has an inferior status relatively to men and the former deserves little respect from the latter in any spheres of life.
Againts this background, this conversation hope to initiate a more lively discussion on the underrated roles of women in our complex past and at the same time debunk such patriarchal mindset that are prevalent in our society. For the session we are lucky to have three distinguished panelist who founded Sejarah Wanita, a project designed to build a virtual archive of Malaysian women’s history, organised by themes and focusing on different periods and aspects of women’s lives and work.
The details of the event are as follow:
Date: 22nd October 2016 (Saturday)
Time: 11.00AM-1.00PM
Venue: MCCHR Pusat Rakyat Loyar Burok, Jalan Pantai Baharu, Kerinchi, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Title: Conversation on the Stories of Malayan Women
Panelist: Ezrena Marwan, Juana Jaafar, Dr Rusaslina Idrus
Here is the background of the invited speakers:
Juana Jaafar freelances in the field of communications. Her work often insects with human rights advocacy, especially on issues concerning women and young people. She has keen interest in content development with an aim to amplify women’s voices particularly in the digital sphere.
Rusaslina Idrus is a senior lecturer and coordinator at the Gender Studies Programme, University of Malaya. She is trained as a social anthropologist, and has particular interest in indigenous rights issues and subaltern studies. She is also a board member of Pusat Sejarah Rakyat and is a trainer for the PSR-run Oral History workshop series.
Ezrena Marwan is the founder of Malaysia Design Archive, a digital platform that aims to give context to the history of graphic design in Malaysia. She is a graphic designer passionate about women’s rights, history and design.