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Listen to Women: A Conversation With Obama Scholar Ana María González Forero
Ana María is the co-founder of FEM (Fundación para la Educación Multicultural), a Colombian nonprofit based in Cartagena that works with indigenous and afro communities. Her organization focuses on local women by “listening to their needs, connecting them with relevant stakeholders, and fostering a sense of community ownership over sustainable development projects.”
As opposed to traditional NGOs that frequently impose plans and goals on the groups they want to serve, “since day one, we’ve allowed communities to establish the agenda,” Ana María told Mindful Feminism. “Our intention is and always has been to see what people need us for, and not the other way around,” she added.
This way of doing things has led to fascinating results that Ana María describes as entirely unexpected. “Focusing on women was not a conscious choice at the beginning. But when you’re letting communities establish the agenda, you realize that the people in these villages are women. Men are frequently absent, they work in other cities or have multiple families and live between two homes, thus when we’re talking about rural societies, we’re talking about the lives of women.”
This emphasis has reaped numerous benefits for the people of Cartagena that FEM works with. As an example, Ana María…
