LA WEB DE READING COMPREHENSION PREFERIDA POR LOS HISPANOHABLANTES

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A WOMAN'S PLACE

Kelly McParland

A serious examination
of women's world

If she is bright enough, ambitious enough, has a good idea and wants to make it work, a woman in Nairobi can go to one of the few banks in the world designed exclusively for women, and it will make sure that she gets a loan. If she wants to learn to read, however, it may be more difficult.

Such are the contradictions in the status of women as the 20th. century was drawing to a close. The Kenya Women Finance Trust of Nairobi has operated for a year, easing women into the male-dominated world of banking by helping with loans, providing advice and offering technical help. Yet in Africa as a whole, eight women out of ten are illiterate.

It is an irony typical of the twenty years the UN has devoted to bettering the lot of one half of the world's population. Remarkable success stories co-exist with blatant discrimination, huge advances are balanced by humiliating retreats.

In India, for example, a development plan has been introduced to improve job training for women and ensure equal access to employment. Across the border in Pakistan, if a woman has been raped she has to have the supporting testimony of four men in order to bring charges against her assailant. If she cannot provide sufficient evidence, then she may well be flogged - even killed.

In Japan, 1999 statistics showed that only 2.3 per cent of women were unemployed. Yet another survey showed that 72 per cent of the Japanese believe a woman should put her family ahead of her job, and less than one third thought a woman had a right to divorce a husband she could not stand.

In the working world, women still come a distant second to men. While unemployment has skyrocketed almost everywhere in the past ten years, the increase has generally affected women more sharply

Only in a few countries, such as the United States and Japan, women enjoy a higher rate of employment than men. But in both countries women are paid far less. In the U.S. the average working woman earned 15,000 annual dollars in 1990, whereas the average man earned 25,000 annual dollars. In Japan the differential between men and women's wages was greater in 1990 than it had been in 1975.

According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), lower wages for women are common in most countries, irrespective of the level of economic development. The ILO believes that women are steered towards the "traditional" jobs that men do not want and that they are blocked from higher education and skills training.

While in the developed world there are more female lawyers, managers and politicians than before, and women in communications are really numerous, they are still heavily outnumbered by men. In developing countries women's work is often little more than the most menial of labour. The ILO gives the example of women in Thailand who are required to spend eight hours a day staring at hair-width gold wires through microscopes, building up to 1000 microchips a day, at 70 wires per chip.

Without training, women cannot get at the credit, technology and financial resources needed to improve their lot. Six out of ten of the world's illiterates are women and in 1990 the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) counted seven countries where virtually no women could read or write.

Even in Europe the work opportunities for women leave a lot to be desired. It is worth remembering that in Britain only 7% of top managers are women. Although Britain was famous for having a woman Prime Minister only a fraction of Parliament's seats were held by women and there were no other women in the Cabinet. According to activist Georgina Ashworth the last decade in Britain has been a failure, partly because "women themselves haven't been allowed to hear about it, so they haven't been able to make demands. "

Elsewhere in the world women have found cultural prejudices as hard to change as political ones. In Japan, for example, women are not allowed to enter the sacred circle of their national sport -the sumo wrestling- because they are considered "unclean". The spread of Islamic fundamentalism has meant the return of the chadorism and the loss of many hard-won freedoms. Hard to believe, female circumcision is still practised in many countries and in South Africa women aren't covered by labour legislation, maternity benefits or unemployment insurance provisions.

Yet perhaps we shouldn't spend all of the time complaining. The United Nations Decade for Women may be judged a failure, but at least it has been a step in the right direction. Women's interests have become an issue: thirty years ago they weren't even spoken about.

If you like statistics this chart from IPPF shows you some surprising figures. According to the UN, women do 66% of the world's working hours, but they receive 10% of the world's income and own 1% of the world's property.

WOMEN

SENEGAL

SAUDI ARABIA

PHILIPPINES

USA

BOLIVIA

FINLAND

Female illiteracy
rate (%)

94

98

13

0.5

46

0

Female (12-17) school enrolment (%)

25

30

61

96

45

87

% women in
total labour force

31

3

23

34

14

40

LIFE EXPECTANCY

45

51

62

77

55

77

Source: Speak Up

GLOSSARY

bright enough: lo suficientemente lista, inteligente
loan: préstamo
drawing to a close: concluyendo, terminando
easing
: dando facilidades a las
as a whole: en general
eight women out of ten: ocho de cada diez mujeres
illiterate: analfabetas (illiteracy: analfabetismo)
blatant
: evidente, manifiesta
huge: enormes
retreats: retrocesos
across the border: al otro lado de la frontera 
raped
: violada
flogged: azotada
stand: soportar, tolerar

has skyrocketed: se ha disparado
more sharply: en forma más pronunciada
women are paid far less: a las mujeres se les paga mucho menos
whereas: mientras que
wages: salarios
steered: dirigidas, encaminadas
skills training: entrenamiento calificado

menial: bajo, servil.
staring at: fijando la mirada en
hair-width gold wires
: filamentos de oro del espesor de un cabello
financial resources: recursos financieros
six out of ten: seis de cada diez
illiterates: analfabetos
it is worth remembering: vale la pena recordar
failure: fracaso
elsewhere: en cualquier otro lugar
sumo wrestling: lucha libre 
spread: difusión
chadorism: chadorismo, dominación

hard-won freedoms: liberaciones logradas con mucha dificultad
female circumcision: la circuncisión femenina
judged: juzgadas como, criticadas de
issue: tema importante de conversación.
IPPF:
International Planned Parenthood Federation (Federación Internacional de Planificación de la Familia)

 

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