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Making babies is big business in India. The Akanksha clinic is the largest outfit producing infants for clients, often foreigners, who can't conceive themselves. For the women who get pregnant on demand it's a way of escaping poverty but it's still deeply traumatic. Intimate narratives chart the aspirations and fears of client and surrogate. A sensitive but powerful ob-doc exposing the emotional hurdles involved in breaking the laws of mother nature....
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In the UAE, strict laws surround sex outside marriage. Prisons are filled with women who have fallen pregnant while unmarried, often due to abuse. Many are migrant domestic workers, particularly vulnerable and often trapped in the UAE by a law which forbids them from leaving the country without permission. This shocking report exposes the hidden persecution of vulnerable women sentenced under UAE law, their pregnancy used as evidence of their crime....
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Taking inspiration from the spiritual concept of Shakti, the Great Mother or supreme female deity of the Hindu religion, this program celebrates the power of women to drive social and economic change in India. Female-centric activism propels an organization that combats the practice of child marriage, and another which has created a banking system for the poor. The video also examines a renowned scientist who promotes eco-feminism and a married couple...
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In a remote corner of southwestern China are the Mosuo, arguably the best remaining example of a matrilineal society in the world today. In this program, anthropologist Chou Wah-Shan-one of few outside scholars who have lived and worked extensively with the Mosuo-and Mosuo villagers offer insights into what life is like in the 91 communities where women rule and husbands don't exist. Commerce, belief systems, rituals and festivals, and the day-to-day...
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Pregnancy amongst teenagers is becoming a growing problem in todays society. About 1 million teenagers become pregnant each year and more than 530,000 give birth. Dealing with the responsibility of becoming a parent at a young age is one of the hardest tasks to take on. Many teenagers don't fully understand the large responsibility and full time commitment it takes to raise another human being, when they themselves still have a lot of growing up to...
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This documentary portrays Australia's aborigines through the eyes of aboriginal women. Archival footage, excellent narration, and storytelling by the women themselves reveal the tribes' struggle for land rights, and the even greater struggle to retain traditional lifestyles and customs in a world that is fast disappearing. As the stories are told, ancient myths and legends including that of the Dreamtime (creation) are illuminated, and their importance...
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African-American women have captured the moral imagination of mainstream America through their essays, novels, poetry, and other artistic endeavors, breaching the static lines of race, gender, and class. How have their reflections so clearly articulated the hopes and philosophies of so many? In this program, writers Alice Walker and bell hooks and Ohio State University faculty Dr. Martha Wharton, of the departments of African-American studies and...
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After genocide ripped their nation apart in the 1990s, the women of Rwanda have led the healing process and have helped usher in a much-needed era of stability. By depicting the multifaceted efforts of women activists to build a sustainable peace between the majority Hutus and minority Tutsis, this Wide Angle documentary explores the challenges facing Rwanda. The film features an in-depth examination of the remarkable role Rwandan women play in politics...
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In post-apartheid South Africa, one in two children die of AIDS, one in two women are raped, and 20,000 homicides occur annually-the world's highest murder rate. Against these appalling statistics and a disintegrating social fabric, this program presents examples of South Africa's greatest hope, the spirit of its people, such as Garra, who feeds 400 children a day out of her tiny apartment's kitchen; Kate and Busi, both rape victims and HIV-positive,...
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Taking a grassroots approach to dealing with the physical and societal ills plaguing their countries, individuals and small groups in sub-Saharan Africa are creating success amidst widespread civil and economic instability. This program illustrates five empowering instances of solidarity and self-help: the Yeredeme project, run by single mothers in Mali; the Janjigui So association, for Malian women with improperly healed fistulas; the Fasil Circus,...
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The Ashanti are the best-known tribe of Ghana, comprising around 2 million of the country's 12 million inhabitants. All of the Ashanti kings belong to the Oyoko Dako clan, the clan of chieftains; they are the ones who have created and strengthened the Ashanti nation. This program shows the Ashanti kingdom: it explains the strict hierarchical organization of the village, the importance of the characteristic kente garment, the naming of children, the...
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Filmed in Istanbul and Oslo, this artistic documentary by Turkish/Norwegian filmmaker Nefise Ozkal Lorentzen openly explores what it is like to be both gay and Muslim. Through the interrelated stories of a gay rights activist, a gay imam, drag artists, and others, Gender Me gently denounces homophobia in general, encourages discourse and engagement within Islam as a positive societal approach to coming to terms with sexual otherness, and seeks to...
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This program discusses reproduction and motherhood in the hyper-patriarchal societies of Latin America. Women on different economic and social levels discuss such topics as working mothers, and how the extended family contributes to child-rearing; the sterilization movement; abortion; gay parenting; manipulation of women's reproductive rights by governments; and how access to medical services varies from country to country.
14) Sister
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Madam Bwa has never been trained, but she's delivered over 12,000 babies. She works on filthy floors and in crowded slums, while her mothers-to-be eat dirt to survive. From Ethiopia to Cambodia to Haiti, across the Third World life lies in fragile hands. In this beautiful doc the difficulties of childbirth are laid bare and the strategies to improve maternal health and mortality rates are explored with an affecting clarity. An intimate portrait of...
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Stratification of women in Guatemalan society is the subject of this program. It examines the submissiveness of upper-class women; a new emerging middle class who are defying tradition and cultural expectations to fight for their equal rights; and the indigenous population, who are segregated and discriminated against. Scenes and descriptions of sexual abuse among lower economic groups are graphic, as are descriptions of political terror. Women refugees...
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This program follows the progress of women's rights and equal employment from the Contra war through the term of former president Violeta Chamorro. A former Sandinista fighter who lost a foot laying mines for the Contras wants the government to give her a job; a woman displaced from her job by men returning from the war objects; another whose daughter was murdered by the Somozist Guard wants justice. Dozens of others tell their stories, as Chamorro...
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This is the story of Mexican women who have fought, and continue to fight, for equality and women's rights. They are women looking for children kidnapped during political pogroms, journalists, writers, and political activists. Machismo and the resulting sexism, as well as Catholicism and its perpetuation of the myth of the Virgin Mary as the standard for feminine behavior, are discussed as social factors contributing to the continued subjugation of...
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Speaking in broad sociocultural terms, the overall Western attitude toward Africans has been one of race-based condescension. This program addresses that historically conflicted relationship and ways in which it is changing in sub-Saharan Africa through the stories of an idealistic young French-born woman involved with the Yeredeme project, which supports and educates single mothers in Mali; a Chilean-born freelance photographer/TV cameraman who has...
19) Relative values
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In Tunisia, a home for the elderly is quite unusual since most older people are automatically cared for by their families. This program explores how Tunisia, both as a state and a culture, negotiates the task of providing for its growing senior population, a task many Tunisians see as illustrative of key differences between European and Arab values. Along with a tour of a home for the elderly in Tunis, the program canvasses the views of younger people...
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Are gender roles universal when it comes to leading a family or family group? Do the concepts of father, mother, offspring, and sibling change among different cultures? Is there a formula for the perfect family? In the Himalayas, that recipe may involve multiple husbands, and in certain provinces of China, it would be ridiculous for a man to be head of the household, while some communities in the U.S. have a long way to go before shedding the idea...