For too long, women of African ancestry have been guilted into shame and shamed into grief only to be given lines written by others for solace. We co-created this edition as a reflection of the ever-dynamic and actively resilient mosaic we know to be embodied in each daughter of the Horn. In the questions we’ve asked ourselves and each other, we find the answer always rooted in our untold histories, experiences and everyday realities. Both questions and answers always recenter the question of belongingness and identity in the form of - “I am because you are” - Ubuntu.  In the context of the ongoing war, displacement, and political chaos, these contributions in one way or another questioned what do internationally adopted institutional resolutions on “Women, Peace and Security” offer us – as women – when they engage us from a position of futile political equations and statistical information, that violates the spirit and essence of our human experience?  Until we, as African women, recognise that there is no postcolonial/ decolonial “women, peace and security” institution or practice from somewhere else, and begin to explore resources we have in our corner among Africans, any attempt at addressing our holistic healing or our collective liberation will be rendered obsolete. The journey of this edition is our reckoning with that recognition. We invite you to join the conversation and #AskMoreQuestions.

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editorial

On Holding Half the Sky: Stories of Resilience

Dimah Mahmoud & Tigist Shewarega Hussen

The editors write about co-creating this edition as a reflection of the ever-dynamic and actively resilient mosaic they know to be embodied in each daughter of the Horn.

Of The Things War Did To Us

Etenat Awol

What is belonging? What is its role in our lives - if any? Are we free to belong, freed by belonging or bound by it? In this piece, Etenat pulls the curtains allowing us a little peek into her exploration of these questions through her experience of a war ravaging all she knew -or thought she knew - of land, love and liberation. Her articulation of the sentences exacted upon her (and many daughters of the Horn like her) through the war of identity politics and beyond is a thread you might find yourself holding and weaving yourself into the fragile but resilient social fabric of this human experience.

Resilience through Internet Research: Reflections on Conducting Research with Front-Line Defenders in the Horn of Africa

Mardiya Siba Yahaya & Neema Iyer

Academically, politically, socially, religiously, realistically and holistically, what is resilience? This reflective piece takes us through the behind the scenes and in-betweens of a research on the (in)visibilitiy of muslim women human right defenders in the Horn of Africa. In their reflection of the research, an invitation to reckon with seeing oneself in the “subject” of one’s research, study or (arguably equally fitting for momentary obsession). In the name of any given cause, how many of us realize how much of us becomes (in)visible and, how intentional are we about it?

Poem: Sad & Lonely

Ayak Chol

It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words. In her poetic contributions to our edition, Ayak blatantly challenges this as she paints and captures thousands of images, voices in and between each word. 

Poem: The Womb's Curse

Ayak Chol

It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words. In her poetic contributions to our edition, Ayak blatantly challenges this as she paints and captures thousands of images, voices in and between each word. 

[Podcast] Stories of Resilience: Daughters of the Horn Using Digital Spaces for Activism

Cecilia Maundu

In her Podcast, “Digital Dada,” on a special series called “Stories of Resilience”, Cecilia Maundu invites Lucia Ayiela from Kenya. This conversation explores the experience of women journalists and digital advocates in the region. Lucia Ayiela shares with us her journey, the high and low points of her career, as a digital activist and how she empowers women activists to join the digital activism space. Stay tuned for more.

RAPT

Dahlia Mahmoud

Too emotional, too angry, too oppressed, too something for a system built on severing every umbilical cord there is between Mother and child: Mother Earth, Mother Nature and Mother Africa. What is it like being a Black Muslim Woman in the Arab world or the world in general? In this contribution, Dahlia viscerally confronts some of the can, cannots, do and do nots society throws in the face of Muslim women in its continued effort to silence and tokenize them.

Tigray: Life Beneath the Sealed Skies

Saba Mah'derom & Alem Berhe

Out of sight, out of mind - is one of the realest phenomena confronting warriors of truth and justice on the forefront of humanitarian disasters. Beyond the solidarity profile picture changes and statuses of “please pray” for whichever catastrophe that is ravaging the very heart and soul of humanity anywhere on this planet of ours, there are very real, live humans literally dying to live. Diasporans ring the alarm the best they can knowing too well that the media is only there serving a political agenda. But what happens when the diaspora can’t reach their family? Can’t see the news? Can’t hear the cries? The world calls it a black-out, but what happens when it’s really a black-in keeping all the cries for justice from going out and reaching you? Yes, you.

RED: A Documentary Exploring the Cost Of Menstruation

Joan Njeri

Njeri Maina produced a documentary that speaks about the “Poverty Period” in Kenya. In her production, Njeri tries to build and weave a narrative that exposes the cultural stigma and stereotypes that are related to menstruation and how such socially constructed beliefs and ideas are used to discriminate against women and girls in public and private spaces. Njeri also explores how class status determines women’s pleasant and unpleasant experiences of care during the menstrual season. Pushing this analysis further, she makes the connection between the financial struggles of women and girls to buy a pad for menstrual care and its impact on the girl-child’s education as they are exposed to social stigma in school.

The War On Time

Dimah Mahmoud

Co-editor Dr. Dimah shares with us this existential piece she wrote “The War on time.” With it she sets us free from slaving ourselves by the entrapment of time that we created with a flawed understanding of time, and what time is meant for. The piece is also meant to provide a reflective piece into the journey Dimah and Tigist have had in this editorial process; and the conception of time as we have experienced it in different layers of relationships and commitments – friendship, institutional structures, coordinating with contributors, and with ourselves as individual beings.
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