Making Latin Women Visible
History
SIEMPRE was born. We carried out projects previously planned as part of the organization’s activities: a socio-educational workshop, debates, and focus groups on gender violence. Likewise, we started building a network among civil society, academic, artistic and political actors, and generated strategies for the integration of Latin American migrants in Belgium.
We did a first exploratory study of the challenges and difficulties that Latin American women experience in Belgium. Problems related to language, health, inclusion, education, discrimination, and violence: psychological, economic, or physical. We started building bridges between Latin American women and Belgium projects. The result was a study on the well-being of Latin American women living in Belgium. We accompanied this study on cases of resident women with the aim to understand their integration process and their problems as well as the possible solutions or alternatives. We organized focus groups, debates with specialists to talk about different topics, such as femicides, the ratification of the Istanbul convention, the CEDAW women rights and the invisibility and vulnerability of migrant women. We listened to women’s testimonies through several interviews among Latin American migrant women.
As grassroot organization we helped migrant women to understand the functioning of the Belgian social institutions and services, especially those that focus on migrants, refugees, women, and discriminations. In permanent and personal communication service we support and accompanied women in their paths into the different Regions of Belgium. In the follow of cases to help we consult in network to listen recommendation from other alternatives to the solution of their eventual problems.
In partnership with European and International Networking: We strengthen our networks, taking advantage of our presence in Brussels. We joined the European Networking Against Racism (ENAR) and the Discrimination and Federatie van Sociaal-Culturele vereningingen van mensen met een migratieachtergrond (FMDO), being part of their member board and being part of World Solidarity Forum (WSF). Likewise, we expanded our networks and alliances beyond Europe, with a special focus on Latin American feminist organizations and diasporas worldwide performing the first international networking with specialist and leaders from Ecuador, Chile, Argentina, México and Latino diaspora’s sitting in the United States of America Latin American and the Caribean and Europe EnReDHadas, Tejiendo feminismos por el mundo.(Weaving feminisms in the world).
We participated in several congresses and presented papers at the Congress on Migrantion and Mental Health organized in Brussels, Colloquium Local communities and Indigenous research at ULB, and Hands on Sexual Harassment: Has #MeToo Redefined the status quo? at the European Commission.
Presentation and recently write works to diffuse Latin American women writers in different places in Belgium.
Presentations of Latin women Candidates running for the federal and deputy election political. Presentations of their plans and agenda in the different Political Parties and Regions of Belgium
Testimony of journalist Marcia Scantlebury, Chilean Political Refugee and Dictator period and survivor of the 1980s.
International collaboration with the Collective Las Aquelarre Feminist in Mexico: Feminism as collective and social movements, the experience in Mexico City, course with 8 online sessions.
Presentation of the study of Latin American Women and Mental Health who live in Belgium in the WSF.
Presentation of Latinas writers from Colombia, Perú, Mexico, Chilean and Argentina in Bewogen (National day of Literature), in the Voorlezen Week.
Research and exploratory project to identify the needs and migration trajectory of Latin American Women to Belgium.
Meeting with migrant women and focus group to talk about the migration trajectory and the integration experience in Belgium. Precisely in Antwerp
Program (pilot) Mujeres Siempre, Mujeres with 5 Interviews made to indispensable Latin American Women who are living in Belgium: Ms. Norma Goicochea – Ambassador of Cuba, Ms. Guadalupe Ramos – Feminist Lawyer, Ms. Silvia Ábalos – Mexican Artist, Ms. Ligia Uribe – Defender of Human Rights – Colombian, Ms. Cecilia Torres – Ottignies-LLN-Ecuadorian Councilor.
Presentation in the national week of Literature, InterlitraTour with the reading of poetry by writers from Belgium, Sudan, Vietnam, Colombia, Mexico and Turkey with traditional music from Peru.
Conference with the PhD. Guadalupe Ramos Ponce legal expert in law and femicide in the framework of t within the framework of the international he International Women Day in Brussel
Participation in the World March with the testimony and participation of victims.
Vision
We look forward to improving Latin American women’s dignity and life conditions in Europe, through their emancipation, promoting the mutual support with other Latin diaspora`s, visibiliser and endorsing the inclusion in the diversity of the public spheres.
We Latin-American Women are on the move, as a macro-diaspora with a cultural heritage of resistance and defense of life, dignity, and justice. We as women and in continue of our ancestors are the actors in the fight to support the creativity and our roles as the creators of other utopias.
We assume the term “Latina women” to remember and honored to those migrant women who fight and defended the rights of the agricultural workers in the United States who were so called.
At SIEMPRE we work as a unified network, to impulse our voices to make ourselves visible as migrants and as bearers of bio-aesthetic and cultural diversity. We seek to weave a collective fabric of alliances with other women and sisters from diverse backgrounds to provide a platform for their knowledge and empower their participation.
Mission
We promote the inclusion of Latin American women and girls helping them achieve the knowledge and skills needed for adaptation and integration. We believe in its importance for social cohesion in Europe and on other continents where Latina women live.
We invite them to construct and reinforce the channels of social communication, to gain access to spaces of discussion, and to voice and make visible the problems we experience and our search for solutions.
As citizens and as migrants, we disseminate valuable and important information on the topics of health (general, mental, and reproductive), science, agriculture, environment, history, trade, economics, justice, peace, art and other areas. We offer perspectives on gender, contributing in this way not only to Latina women but also to the countries in which we live.
Team
Cecilia Torres
Ecuadorian and Community Councilor of Louvain la Neuve-Ottignie. Liaison and inter-institutional coordinator of Wallonie-Bruxelles in projects and activities with a gender perspective Forever.
Thamara Cruz
Mexican based in Belgium since 2010, Coordinator and Co-Founder of Desarrollo de Proyectos Artesanales y Diseño DEPROART A.C. and SIEMPRE.
Silvia Ábalos
Singer, Mexican artist. Liaison and cultural advisor in Mexico and Belgium.
Members
Amancay Egas
Julia V. Erazo
Feminist and activist in human rights and violence against women. Inter-institutional liaison and coordinator in the Brussels Capital Region.
Magdalena Bordagorry
Vera Baltazar Medina
Certified Project Manager (PMP®) with experience in the collaborative implementation of corrective actions to drive process improvements. She is currently participating in Siempre with the Migratory Routes project.
Catherine González
Belgian-Peruvian, Erasmus Mundus student of the Master's in Transnational Migration (MITRA).
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