Stories of Girls’ Resistance.
Girls are
born resisters.
So, why are they so often depicted as passive victims?
Introducing Stories of Girls’ Resistance, a feminist storytelling project that tells the inspiring, complex and unfiltered stories of girls pushing back and imagining better worlds for themselves and us all.
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Across historical moments, places, ages and identities, girls have been resisting patriarchal violence, racism and other forms of oppressions, organizing and agitating in their communities for millennia. Yet their struggles are almost systematically - and often deliberately - obscured and hidden from view.
What history will never erase is girls’ voices. Conversations with girls reveal the fresh, creative and brave tactics they use to push back, to transcend and ultimately to imagine better worlds for themselves and us all.
Girls have a fundamental, indelible right to narrate their own lives in all their complexity and messiness, to see accurate images of themselves in the world and to engage in deep dialogue about their realities. Together, a group of feminist activists and storytellers are shining light on these hidden stories and bringing these essential narratives to life through Stories of Girls’ Resistance.
About Stories of Girls’ Resistance:
Stories of Girls’ Resistance represents a living library of first hand accounts of girls resistance - told by girls and older women reflecting on their activism as girls. The ever growing collection currently holds 120 stories from 65 countries across The Caribbean, Eastern and Southern Africa, Europe, Central Asia and the Caucuses, Latin America, North America and West Africa.
The knowledge, tools and thought leadership produced through this project offers a deeply (almost painfully) intimate window into girls' inner worlds, whilst at the same time having much to say about the world at large. Together, the stories exist as an offering to girl activists and social justice movements. A living testament to the political power of girls activism across time and place.
These stories show unequivocally that girls are leaders, culture- and narrative-shapers, and movement-makers. Girls are resistors, pushing back against marriage and violence, agitating to stay in school and make decisions in their communities. Girls are change-makers, shifting mindsets, laws, hearts and behaviours Working across generations with young feminists and older activists, to shape destinies for their households, communities and nations.
Who we are
This project is held through the collective energy, intellectual power, love, resistance and connections of feminist activists, strategists and story-tellers from around the world. Together, we are collecting, archiving, analyzing and re-interpreting the stories through a range of creative methodologies
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Alian Ollivierre, a proud and passionate island girl from the Caribbean, Wife and Mother. She is a Social Activist, Business and Non-Profit Consultant, Coach and Trainer, Author, and Founder of I Am A Girl (Barbados), which focuses on building community, leadership and safe spaces for all girls and young women, through a feminist lens.
Ayat Mneina is a Libyan activist, digital media strategist and researcher passionate about feminist movement building in the Middle East and North Africa. She is the founder of ShababLibya and is committed to amplifying and widening spaces for youth and women voices.
Catherine Nyambura, Pan African feminist and independent consultant working at the intersection of advocacy, research and programming. She is passionate about amplifying daily lived realities women and girls in their diversity and invested in co-creating feminist magic.
Françoise Moudouthe, African feminist with roots in Cameroon, founder of African feminist platform Eyala, and passionate about nurturing feminist movements and creating safe spaces for African girls and womxn to learn, connect and work towards making feminist futures a reality.
Jody Myrum has a lifelong commitment to the freedom and safety of all girls and young women. Grounded in social work and a deep commitment to racial, gender and youth justice, Jody is a feminist activist, strategist, and researcher. She works across movements, organizations and philanthropy to center girls and young women and to move resources and power to those working to build their collective power. Jody is currently working as a consultant.
Mihaela Drăgan is a multidisciplinary artist with an education in theatre who lives in Romania and works in several other countries. She is the co-founder of the first Roma theatre in Romania - Giuvlipen Theatre Company, for which she is an actress and playwright, a cultural phenomenon on the local scene. Giuvlipen’s performances have a feminist and antiracist rhetoric and bring to life the issues of early marriage, racism, hate speech, hyper-sexualization and heteronormativity in order to promote discussion and critical thinking in our society. She was one of the six finalists for The 2017 Gilder/Coigney International Theatre Award from New York and a 2020 nominee, an award which acknowledges the exceptional work of 20 theatre women around the world.
Natalie A. Collier is a curious, observant, hesitant and intuition-led leader who finds just as much value in the philosophical writings of bell hooks as she does the folklore of J. California Cooper. She is deeply invested in the liberation of spirit of U.S-southern Black girls and woman, seeing that translated to their material conditions and having their worldviews and knowledge be part of national and international conversations. She leads personally and professionally—which are, virtually, the same for her—with the ideology, “power is space and time.”
Perla Vazquez, Mexican activist feminist, co-Founder of FRIDA | The Young Feminist Fund and specialist in working with Girls, Youth Movements, Philanthropy. Perla is passionate about healing and taking care of the earth.
Dr. Ramatu Bangura: Black & African feminist, mother, scholar and child of immigrants who is also a strategist & relationship-builder at the intersections of gender & racial justice, immigrant rights and youth movements. I seek opportunities to be of service to and build with others the world I'd like my daughter to inherit-- one where all people are valued, seen and supported.
Rosa Bransky, feminist strategist and researcher, co-Founder of Purposeful, an Africa rooted Global hub for girls activism. A life-long advocate for girls and young women, Rosa believes in the political power of young feminists to lead us all to liberation.
Ruby Johnson, feminist organiser, strategist and researcher, fiercely committed to redistributing resources and power to young feminist movements, centring girls and young womxn in all she does. Co-Executive Director FRIDA | The Young Feminist Fund (2013-2019) and currently working as a social justice consultant.
Sharanya Sekaram identifies as a feminist writer, researcher, and activist based in Sri Lanka and works primarily as an independent consultant in the gender space. She is passionate about the democratization of information and resources, as well as access to networks and spaces. In 2018 she and Widya Kumarasinghe co-founded Everystory Sri Lanka. Everystory Sri Lanka is a collective of young Sri Lankan feminists who identify as a storytelling collective. They work towards creating spaces where alternative narratives of those underrepresented, historically marginalised and/or oppressed, and not seen in the mainstream spaces of Sri Lanka and South Asia, find a voice.
What comes next?
Over the next year we will be bringing these stories to life through art, music, theatre, song, poetry and other forms of creative documentation, as well as archiving all 120+ stories and accompanying analysis in 5 languages. Please sign up below to be alerted when new content is shared.
