Personal stories weave together our individual experiences to reveal a picture of a community, a group and a country. Sally Shackleton highlights how digital story telling can empower women to protect themselves as well as improve their lives.
“Rape still haunts me. Not only me, but also my kids.” This is the opening line of Joyce Machepe’s short movie. Her strength and her resilience are carried through in her voice, and the triumphant image of her climb to the top of Mount Kilimajaro makes everyone who watches her movie, smile.
“I feel imprisoned in a free country.” Busi’s voice tells of her own struggle for freedom and safety; and her anger at the violence and pain she sees. Busi’s short movie about her work and life reminds me of the secondary trauma that many of us working in the gender sector, experience.
These are just two of the 15 short movies – or digital stories - that were produced through the Women’sNet Digital Stories project. The stories are available on a DVD produced by Women’sNet and funded by the Foundation for Human Rights, accompanied by a manual with ideas on how to use the stories for human rights education and training.
What is digital story telling?
Story telling has long been a tool for learning lessons, preserving memory and history, transmitting culture and tradition, entertaining others, for healing and caution.
Every person has stories to tell, and it is in the telling that we discover how much of our experiences and learning we have in common. Stories make our connection with others and with the world real. They weave together our individual experiences to reveal a picture of a community, a group and a country.
The “digital” in digital story telling, refers to the medium used to transmit stories. Digital stories, simply, are stories produced, stored and disseminated using digital media; short movies that you can watch from your DVD player or on a computer.
Making ICTs work for women
Information and communication technologies or ICTs often seems like an abstract luxury – but the Women’sNet digital story telling project shows how important ICTs are in making women’s voices heard.
Before newer technologies were available, only the elite had access to the means to create media. Digital technologies have made making movies, communication and information tools much more accessible.
In the digital story telling project, participants were able to make a short movie about their lives – reflecting their very real struggles, pain and triumphs. We used digital scanners to scan old photographs into a computer, digital cameras to take pictures of things and people, and digital voice recorders to record “voice-overs” for the movies.
Producing and directing our stories
Participants in the digital stories workshops came from the Gay and Lesbian Archives (GALA), the Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW), Out LGBTI Well Being and the Nisaa Institute for the Advancement of Women.
We had two workshops at our computer training centre in Newtown. Each workshop ran over four days, with a screening day where all participants came to view their stories.
The training began with a day dedicated to developing a script. At first, participants had either too much story to tell, or felt like they didn’t have a story to tell at all! After going through a supportive story telling process in a group, each participant developed a written script of about a page long. Women’sNet ensured a confidential, supportive environment so that sharing – and healing- could occur. It was important for us to make sure that the workshop was a place where participants felt safe.
After scripts were finalised, we recorded them on digital voice recorders to create a “voice-over” for the movie. We then worked on editing images and taking photographs to illustrate the story. The last step was to put it all together on special software on the computers at the training Centre.
Significantly participants were involved as both the producers and directors of their own movies – from script writing to selecting images to editing their movies.
Training for transformation: using the stories
Women’sNet has produced a manual that accompanies the DVD of stories. The manual gives trainers and facilitators ideas on how to use the digital stories in human rights training and education. We have included 15 of the movies produced on the DVD, others are available on request.
The stories provide facilitators with materials that provoke thought, illustrate real life rights and challenge trainees. The stories resonate with South African women’s contexts – reflecting language, voices and circumstances that echo women’s experiences generally and make powerful additions to training on human rights.
The manual and the DVD fill a gap in the availability of alternative training materials that both reflect, and are suited to, the South African context. The stories cover issues such as homophobia, sexual violence, domestic violence, breast cancer, HIV and violence, motherhood, identity, coming out as gay, love and relationships, being a community worker, cultural context of violence reporting abuse to the police and many more.
If you are a human rights trainer you can order a booklet and DVD for your organisation by emailing Sally Shackleton
