March 6, 2008

New York City Celebrates
International Women's Day 2008

On the Money: Women Investing in Women

Nearly 400 participants gathered at St. Bartholomew's Church in New York City on Thursday, March 6 in celebration of International Women's Day. The celebration, organized by a coalition of organizations—including The Hunger Project, St. Bartholomew’s Church, the UN Division for the Advancement of Women, UNIFEM and the Women’s Media Center—was one of the only public events in New York City outside the United Nations system. The celebration’s theme “Women Investing in Women!” was interpreted by each of the featured speakers in distinct and powerful ways.

Photographs by Jamie Wasserman

Hunger Project-organizer, Carol Coonrod (left), and speakers Helen LaKelly Hunt and Mahnaz Maqsudi are among the nearly 400 participants gathered for the celebration.
The event opened with a performance by the Def Dance Jam Workshop, an inter-generational company of deaf, hearing and physically or developmentally challenged artists committed to strengthening the relationship between the “differently able” and “traditionally able” communities.
Drummers led the Def Dance Jam Workshop dancers up the aisle.		Reverend Elizabeth Garnsey welcomed the participants.
The event was emceed by the charismatic Khaliah Ali, author on the subject of healthy weight loss, fashion designer of her own clothing line, supporter of many charitable causes and daughter of boxing great Muhammad Ali.		Helen LaKelly Hunt, Founder of The Sister Fund, said that we are in a unique moment in history. She claimed that for the first time a significant population of women has both the resources and inclination to invest in genuine measures to improve conditions for women and their economic, political, and spiritual empowerment.
Mahnaz Maqsudi, Vice President of the Charitable Services Group at Goldman Sachs, described “10,000 Women," an initiative launched by her company, that funds business and management education for women from the developing world with a view to enrich and support entrepreneurship.		Amy Goodman, executive producer and host of independent current affairs program Democracy Now! used the occasion to highlight the lesser known, more subversive facets of historic female figures. She spoke of Helen Keller, who used her famously hard-won communication skills to speak out as an anti-war and socialist activist, and Rosa Parks, who is often painted as a humble seamstress too exhausted to move to the back of the segregated buts, but in fact was a deliberate activist. Goodman called for greater democracy in the media so that stories of courageous women like these would not be sanitized.
Voices from around the World In this section of the program, speakers shared poems, quotes, and proverbs to bring women from around the world into the room.
Supriya Banavalikar from India		Elizabeth Ghunney from Ghana
Taisha Lavarello from New York		Mamane Rabiou Idrissa from Niger
Marilyn Graman from New York		Shahirah Majumdar from Bangladesh
Joanna Rush delivered a theatrical performance from her play, Asking for It.
Several Ex-Rockettes joined Joanna for the grand finale of her performance.
La!Quartet entertained guests with jazz, classical and popular music throughout the evening.