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Bongiwe Nkomazana on Gender

As Zimbabweans we have gone through it all.

I mean think of any hardship and we have faced it and unfortunately have become a mockery to the outside world in the process. One thing that we stand by and brag about ever so loudly is our literacy rate.

I am not sure whether it comes from a place of a true feeling of accomplishment or it is in effort to save every ounce of dignity that is left still attached to being Zimbabwean but we boast of high literacy.

I have never disputed the importance of education. Other than it leading you to a career, I believe that education opens up your mind and allows you to function at a level that is higher than just basic. Not to say that without formal education one is unwise because that would be false but in today’s world, it does condition our brains to push limits thus reaching our full potential.

However, let me not dwell too much on justifying the need of education because like I said, as Zimbabweans we are pro-school.

Needless to say that I was shocked, when I was doing my rounds on the internet to get a feel of how women are doing in terms of literacy, to realise that in this “what a time to be alive century” the number of illiterate women is actually increasing instead of decreasing.

A report released as recently as 2015 states that two thirds of the world’s illiterates are women due to the rise in population but also due to other factors like how school children whom have not been able to consolidate their knowledge sufficiently will relapse into illiteracy.

I knew women were still somewhat lagging behind in this department but I did not imagine that we made up such a big fraction still. On the bright side we cannot dim the lights on the massive improvements on literacy around the world that have seen an increase in the enrolment of girls in schools throughout the world and even a global improvement on the youth literacy rate from 83 to 91 percent.

A lot has been done but a lot more still needs to be done if we are to achieve literacy for all as per the Sustainable Development Goals’ objectives.

Not only in Africa but in many parts of the world women are still thought to have no business, which is actually no right, to meddle with books. Unfortunately, this backward thinking, which is an evil in itself, exists and comes in many forms like religion, culture and even a man in a suit.

As a matter of fact just to drive the point home, last Sunday on a show called “Date my Family” the bachelor looking for a lady friend was a very peculiar gentleman.

He was an arrogant chauvinist that came off very strongly as the type that would demand his wife to stay in the kitchen and to never even dream of a book. I disliked him and sadly for women all around the world, these men walk among us and are hindering women and girls in some way or form.

This is further perpetuated by the fact that some women have neither the time to study because of their endless chores and responsibilities nor the money to buy books because they are living on less than $1.25 a day. Getting an education then becomes another hassle that most of these women will choose not to burden themselves with.

It is a vicious cycle because the daughters that they raise are not only born into an underprivileged set up but because their parents, mothers in particular, have little to no formal education they will subconsciously learn what a woman in their context has access to and then get comfortable being in that cycle.

This is what they call intergenerational transmission of illiteracy. This is where negative attitudes towards education develop too and to go back and try to convince a child that has made up their mind on the purposelessness of education is a cumbersome task.

A study carried out by BS Vasudeva Rao and P Viswanadha Gupta breaks down the cause of low female literacy into a number of factors.

Three stood out to me and the first one was the lack of educational facilities which we see especially in Zimbabwe’s rural areas. Children walk tens of kilometres everyday just to get to the nearest school.

Keep in mind that this walking takes place after the girl child has woken up in the wee hours of the morning to do her chores only to continue with them after walking back from school later on in the day.

Before you try to bring up the boy child’s similar struggles let us go to the next factor which is the social issues. These include things like it being unsafe for a girl child.

When the parents have left for work to go and make a buck, the female children have no choice but to take up that parental role. As a result school goes to the bottom of their priority list leading to things like early marriages and just broken dreams. So as much as both boys and girls might have to walk the long distances, there are plenty more issues affecting girls that are piled on to the walking that make it more likely for a girl to cancel school out completely. The third one was the economic factor which I feel like we as Zimbabweans know too well to even talk about.

The resistance or rejection of education for women in particular in some parts of the world and some parts of Zimbabwe is driven by the fear that modernity will ruin their way of life.

However, the benefits of having an educated pool of women are endless with the most important benefit being poverty reduction. Once a woman is provided with equal rights and equal access to education, she is able to participate in economic activity and can therefore feed, clothe and provide for her entire family.

That is the bigger picture which we should all have our eyes on. I am not saying we should all write on this issue but we can all be aware of it and figure out how we can address it in our respectful platforms and offices moving forward.