KARACHI, April 26: A two-day national workshop on “What is feminism in our context” was held by the Women and Development Association (WADA) on Tuesday. The function, co-hosted by the Society for Academic Excellence, St Joseph’s Govt. College for Women and the GEP, was addressed among others by Dr Farzana Bari on its inaugural day.

In a lucid style, the learned professor who heads the gender studies department at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, explained six phases of feminism, from liberal feminism to the echo-feminism in present times. It started in the first quarter of the 19th century when women started talking about their basic human rights. Now when their equal status has been recognized universally and no where discriminatory laws against women can be enacted, women’s special role need to be recognized as the family unit is based on them.

She said that women by nature, as biologically proved, were soft, caring, loving and tolerant, while men were generally aggressive, war managers, although exception in both sexes were there. “Women in the industrial societies demand that they must be duly paid for their domestic work as they were doubly exploited by the capitalist system and the patriarchal system, both running side by side, and also by their male counterparts,” she added.

Dr Farzana Bari said that women being piece-loving were more nature-friendly and could manage the worldly affairs with greater care and compassion. She however, agreed that all women like all men were not equal, as a poor and deprived woman could not compete with a rich and privileged woman.

At the outset, Fatema Hasan welcomed the guests and the audience as most of them were students and teachers from different colleges.

Naveed Anjum briefly explained the topic to be discussed later and Fehmida Riaz outlined the issue of feminism in Pakistan’s perspective. She also introduced Dr Farzana Bari, a doctorate in sociology from England. She is working on the subject of gender studies for some other universities as well.

A discussion among four groups of participants was also held to understand the socially oriented term “gender” as according to them it was not related with the birth of a child.—H.A