Feminists for Jina member Manijeh Moradian, Woman* Life Freedom Collective member Ozi Ozar, and a Begoo Collective member join artist Morehshin Allahyari for a conversation. We conclude with a reading by Rooja Mohassessy.

Thursday, March 16, 2023

1 p.m. Eastern / 10 a.m. Pacific

WOMXN, LIFE, FREEDOM is an online event series for co-learning, co-growing, solidarity, and kinship with our Iranian siblings. We come together as artists, thinkers, and organizers,mainly in the diaspora, to share, amplify, and weave together a refusal of long-lasting cultural and political gender/sexual oppression in Iran. The ongoing “Woman, Life, Freedom” or Jina revolution was sparked by the killing of 22-year-old Kurdish Jina (Mahsa) Amini in the hands of the regime’s police on September 16, 2022. Ever since, Iran has experienced a nationwide uprising, primarily led by women and marginalized ethnic groups demanding an end to the current Islamic regime and the establishment of a society free of oppression, discrimination, and dictatorship. As our days unfold between hope in the power of the Iranian people’s resistance, and despair from unthinkable violence by the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, how might we continue to participate and show solidarity, using “Woman, Life, Freedom is a daily practice” as our mantra? The series explores this question by providing a platform for growth and support through practice-based conversations.

In Pt. I, Building Political Power Through Feminist Collective Work, Iranian artists, scholars, and organizers, each representing a feminist collective or network, will come together for a conversation moderated by the series organizer and artist Morehshin Allahyari. Grassroots feminist collectives are some of many collective groups formed since the killing of Jina (Mahsa) Amini in September 2022. Collective action is usually construed as a tool wielded to affect political and societal change. This panel will explore the goals, work ethics, process, and trial- and-error innate to establishing a collective group, and will make a case for how we can build power through feminist collective work.

Feminists for Jina: is a network of feminist collectives and activists from different cities around the world, with diverse lived and learned experiences and viewpoints, united to echo and reinforce the voice of the ongoing “Jin, Jiyan, Azadî” Revolution of Iran and to strengthen its transnational elements. Since the beginning of the revolution in Iran, the slogan, “Jin, Jiyan, Azadî” has brought those of us in the diaspora together and Jina has become the symbol of our fight. The revolution has strengthened our determination to unite in order to achieve our goal of equality and freedom, and to fight alongside the people inside Iran and other feminist liberation movements for making a better world.

Begoo Collective: A collective of Iranian feminists inside and outside of Iran, Begoo Collective is invested in cultivating a transnational dialogue, particularly among the people of the Global South, in solidarity with the uprising of the Iranian people, especially Womxn, the LGBTQ+, and all marginalized communities. Centering JIN JÎYAN AZADÎ (Woman, Life, Freedom) and in a fight against systemic historical erasure, through a feminist, anti-colonial, and transnational lens, Begoo Collective strives to amplify the Iranian people’s acts of bravery and resistance, and to archive the violence and the oppression their bodies continue to endure.

Woman* Life Freedom Collective: The mission of Woman Life Freedom Collective* is to support the resistance in Iran and forge and fortify transnational unity and solidarity beyond group-based political identities and national borders. We aim to respect, echo, and protect the struggle and resistance of people in Iran and call inflicted upon in all groups to do the same. We invite everyone to set aside the differences and demands only to chant in unison the political demands of this moment and this generation: Woman* Life Freedom.