On Cover Art
This photograph was taken from the Clothes-Line
Project organized by Suriya Women's Development Center (suriyaw@slt.lk)
a few years ago in the Eastern Province of Sri Lanka to highlight
violence against women.
See the article by the Women's Support
Group in this issue of lines regarding their plans for this
year's activities in Sri Lanka. The clothesline project is an
international effort that has caught the imagination of hundreds
of women's groups across the world. For suggestions about how
to start a clothesline project in your community see http://www.clotheslineproject.org/How_to_Start_a_CLP.htm
History of the CLP
(From: http://www.clotheslineproject.org/)
According to the Men's Rape Prevention Project in Washington
DC, 58,000 soldiers died in the Vietnam war. During that same
period of time, 51,000 women were killed mostly by men who supposedly
loved them. In the summer of 1990, that statistic became the catalyst
for a coalition of women's groups on Cape Cod, Massachusetts to
consciously develop a program that would educate, break the silence
and bear witness to one issue - violence against women.
This small, core group of women, many of whom had experienced
some form of personal violence, wanted to find a unique way to
take staggering, mind-numbing statistics and turn them into a
provocative, "in-your-face" educational and healing
tool.
The idea of using a clothesline was a natural. Doing the laundry
was always considered women's work and in the days of close-knit
neighborhoods women often exchanged information over backyard
fences while hanging their clothes out to dry. Participating in
this project provides a powerful step towards helping a survivor
break through the shroud of silence that has surrounded her experience.
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