For immediate release

 

CONTACT:

Nina Serrano

510-763-8204

 

 

(San Francisco, CA) November 5, 2009 --- On Wednesday, November 25th, a noon press conference will take place on the steps of San Francisco’s City Hall, immediately followed by a 1-3 PM healing ceremony for survivors of violence with a multi-arts performance in the esplanade across the street, entitled “They Are all our daughters.”

 

 

What: They Are All Our Daughters! International Day for the Elimination of

Violence Towards Women & Girls

When:  Wednesday, November 25, 2009,  12-3pm       

Where: Steps of San Francisco’s City Hall

Cost:  Free to the Public 

 

As the Bay Area community reels in horror from recent gang rapes, a coalition of local arts and human-rights groups announce a community healing ceremony, free multi-arts performance and press conference. November 25 is the UN mandated day to kick off 16 days of action for the elimination of violence towards women and girls, globally. Similar activities will take place around the world that day.  

 

Bay Area musician and healer MamaCoAtl, an “Artivist” who first initiated this observance in the USA five years ago, said, “This significant day has been marked internationally since 1999. But, in 2004 in San Francisco, a few friends and I first began the commemoration with simple prayers at a Mission Street BART station for a societal healing of violence."

 

Human rights activist and radio host Nina Serrano added that, “While the femicide increases, the urgency to stop the violence increases. So this year our commemoration of the day has expanded to a broad coalition of arts, healing, human rights and feminist groups. ”

 

MamaCoAtl urges the public to initiate activities, “We invite other groups to hold public events to raise this issue throughout the days of activism from Nov. 25 to Dec. 10, which is proclaimed “Human Rights Day.” The public is invited to list their human rights activities on the following website: http://sites.google.com/site/theartvistcoallition/be-a-part-of-16-days-of-artivism

 

The press conference includes a Cherokee opening benediction by Nanette Bradley Deetz; proclamations by Mayor Newsom and Emily M. Murase, PhD, of the San Francisco Department of the Status of Women. Speakers include City Supervisor David Campos along with Alameda poet laureate Mary Rudge, and MamaCoAtl. The MC is Nina Serrano.

  

Chief Luisah Teish and the Women’s Spirituality Program of the Institute for Transpersonal Psychology will lead the ritual healing. The arts performance “They Are All Our Daughters! /!Todas Son Nuestras Hijas!” will feature poet Judy Grahn, singer-songwriter and event initiator MamaCoAtl, choreographer Anne Bluethenthal and Dancers, musician Diana Gameros, Aztec dancers Mixcoatl, and other community artists.

 

Sponsoring organizations include the SF Bay Area Artivist Coalition on Gender Violence, ABD Productions, Survivors International, The SF Bay Area Chapter of the US National Committee of UNIFEM, and the Women’s Spirituality Program at the Institute for Transpersonal Psychology (ITP).

 

The public is invited to participate free of charge. For a full schedule of events please check the website:

 

 

 

Women's activists have marked November 25 as a day against violence since 1981, in remembrance of the brutal assassination of the three Mirabal sisters, political activists, in the Dominican Republic on Nov. 25, 1960, on orders from Dominican ruler Rafael Trujillo.

  

On Dec. 17, 1999, the United Nations General Assembly designated Nov. 25 as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, and invited governments, international organizations and nongovernmental organizations to launch activities to raise public awareness of the problem on that day. See: http://www.un.org/depts/dhl/violence.

 

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