In beginning of June, the staff of Operation 1325s went to Amman, Jordan to meet up with three of their partner organizations during a joint conference. This is to create a methodological materials that will provide tips and tools on how the media and women’s organizations can meet and work together, something that many women have expressed that they lack and which they believe affects the image of how women can participate in peace issues. One of the organizations participating in the conference is the Lebanese organization Media Association for Peace (MAP) and I got the opportunity to sit down and discuss women’s image in the media and the situation in Lebanon with its founder, Vanessa Bassil.
Vanessa started the MAP in 2013 and the organization is working to try to change the way the media report on women in peace processes and peace journalism. They work through advocacy, participation in various projects, publishing materials and also hold training courses for pre-qualified journalists working in different media channels and even for individuals studying to become journalists. During these courses, they take up how it is important to report on women and their work in peace issues and that women get the opportunity to play an active role in the process. MAP consists mainly of volunteers working on various projects / programs and also in the MAP, the majority of young journalists who themselves studying to become journalists. Their main question under Vanessa is to change the way women are portrayed in the media. “We want to change the way women portrayed in the media and this together media and through the media. Do not just show a picture of women and then as either objects or victims, but also women as active as partners and that they have an active role in the public sphere “.
Regarding the project and its purpose, she believes that their role is not only to highlight the media’s perspective in relation to women’s lack of positions, but also in the context of the peace aspect. It is an issue that not only highlight how women are portrayed, but also how they should be portrayed, this ultimately affects the ability to create a peace in which individuals participate. Vanessa says that she is looking forward to this conference because she believes she can bring valuable ideas that she can share with their colleagues in Beirut, Lebanon, and get a better understanding of how other organizations who come from a different background, context, work. But even the image outward, the MAP is interested in getting involved with other types of organizations and not only like-minded who are similarly versed in this type of questions that she herself without creating access to the perspectives of others. Diversity is something that Vanessa brings up several times during the conversation and says that to create a structural change, different actors in society act together and represent a broader picture out which ones actually are a part of society and excluded, namely women .
Annie Svensson, intern.
For more information about the project, email Annika Schabbauer on annika.schabbauer@operation1325.se
