CME Festival: giving voice to women perspectives

BAMBANG MURYANTO

THE JAKARTA POST

Yogyakarta / Tue, May 14, 2019 / 06:37 pm

A recent festival presented a plethora of women’s perspectives on various issues that can sometimes be overlooked by the contemporary mainstream feminist movement.

Dozens of photos depicting the life of the Korowai ethnic group in the jungles of Papua graced the Yogyakarta Cultural Center (TBY) at the end of April. They showed a man carrying a little child while men and women worked on their farms or built khaim (tree houses) together.

Rhidian “Dian” Yasminta Wasaraka took the photos as part of research she began in 2013.

After delving into the survival of the group that is often stigmatized, Dian said Korowai women were very powerful and in a position to reject a marriage proposal, seek a divorce and choose to have a child or not.