The WLUML-WELDD Butterfly Effect Series Are Up Now!

Over the past couple of weeks, we have been uploading one story per day onto the ‘Our Voices’ section of the WELDD portal. These are stories coming from those who participated in the programme and have had personal narratives of change to share. From projects and workshops in Iraq, Nigeria, Cairo and Senegal, these women recount stories of significant change since their experiences of WLUML's activities under the WELDD programme (Women's Empowerment and Leadership Development for Democratisation).

The series is called “The Butterfly Effect” (explained in this introduction here), and with each story you will find yourself wanting more, as each story is more moving than the last. 

We have Fatima*, who managed to prevent one of her schoolchildren from entering a child marriage; Fozia*, who realized the dire need to update the woman's shelter she runs in Iraq; Mariam*, a teeanger at the same shelter, who realized her agency and promised to take new charge of her life; Aisha*; who made a man realize the error of his ways and stop his practise of selling young girls from his tribe into marriage; Salma*, who realized how to reconcile the discord between activism and self-care; Awa*, who gained the strength to stand up to her family's expectations and follow her dreams of cinema school; Zainab*, who used her training in advocacy to stop a man selling girls of his tribe into marriage; Aalia*, who was inspired to take up research on case management on survivors of GBV to better improve her shelter; Anah*, who took up the fight against chaild marriage with greater gusto since her training; May*, who convinced a skeptical, all-male organisation on the need for feminists in their workplace, and succesfully landed the job; Rada*, who realized how important it is for women to take control of their own fate; and finally, Saira*, a young lady at a women's shelter, who saw that it is, in fact, entirely possible for her to return to normal life.

With the conclusion post to wrap everything up, we invite you to share these stories and to stay tuned for upcoming narratives from our project partners Shirkat Gah and Institute for Women’s Empowerment.

We hope you enjoy, discuss, and spread these narratives around. More than anything though, we hope you keep changing, keep empowering, keep giving the world more stories. 

*Names changed for the sake of privacy.