October 21, 2011
Students of Singing Wood Marimba, in Santa Cruz, play Zimbabwean marimba music
In today’s post, I’d like to acknowledge a donation from students of Singing Wood Marimba, in Santa Cruz. The global community of Zimbabwean music, including students and performers, has been one of Tariro’s major sources of support since our inception in 2003. Combining a performing ensemble with a community music centre, Singing Wood Marimba has consistently supported Tariro by performing at benefit events, and through student contributions. Thank you members of Singing Wood Marimba for your support!
I’ll be launching Tariro’s fall fundraising campaign this coming Monday. As we move into fundraising season, I’d like to acknowledge the many other Zimbabwean marimba and mbira performers, schools, and groups that have supported Tariro. Studying the dynamic, participatory marimba and mbira traditions of Zimbabwe is a wonderful way to learn more about African music and culture, and offers the chance to create cultural understanding through musical exchange. I encourage all of our blog readers to contact the center or performing group nearest you, and learn how you can take a class!
Among the many groups that have supported Tariro are: the Zimbabwe Music Festival scheduled for Moscow, ID in 2012; the Kutandara Center in Boulder, CO; the Kutsinhira Cultural Arts Center in Eugene, OR; Rubatano Marimba Center on Whidbey Island, WA; Pembera Youth Marimba in Cle Elum, WA; Chiroto Marimba Ensemble in Moscow, ID; Kubatana Marimba in Albuquerque, NM; Anzanga Marimba in Seattle, WA; the Low Flying Knobs in Boulder, CO; Sadza Marimba and Kuzanga Marimba in Santa Cruz; Hokoyo Marimba and Kudana Marimba in Eugene, OR; Boka Marimba in Portland, OR; and Zuva Marimba, of Santa Fe.
Tariro sends a huge THANK YOU to all of the students, performers, and groups who continue to support our work educating and empowering young women in Zimbabwean communities affected by HIV/AIDS. We couldn’t do it without you!
Students of Singing Wood Marimba, in Santa Cruz, play Zimbabwean marimba music
In today’s post, I’d like to acknowledge a donation from students of Singing Wood Marimba, in Santa Cruz. The global community of Zimbabwean music, including students and performers, has been one of Tariro’s major sources of support since our inception in 2003. Combining a performing ensemble with a community music centre, Singing Wood Marimba has consistently supported Tariro by performing at benefit events, and through student contributions. Thank you members of Singing Wood Marimba for your support!
I’ll be launching Tariro’s fall fundraising campaign this coming Monday. As we move into fundraising season, I’d like to acknowledge the many other Zimbabwean marimba and mbira performers, schools, and groups that have supported Tariro. Studying the dynamic, participatory marimba and mbira traditions of Zimbabwe is a wonderful way to learn more about African music and culture, and offers the chance to create cultural understanding through musical exchange. I encourage all of our blog readers to contact the center or performing group nearest you, and learn how you can take a class!
Among the many groups that have supported Tariro are: the Zimbabwe Music Festival scheduled for Moscow, ID in 2012; the Kutandara Center in Boulder, CO; the Kutsinhira Cultural Arts Center in Eugene, OR; Rubatano Marimba Center on Whidbey Island, WA; Pembera Youth Marimba in Cle Elum, WA; Chiroto Marimba Ensemble in Moscow, ID; Kubatana Marimba in Albuquerque, NM; Anzanga Marimba in Seattle, WA; the Low Flying Knobs in Boulder, CO; Sadza Marimba and Kuzanga Marimba in Santa Cruz; Hokoyo Marimba and Kudana Marimba in Eugene, OR; Boka Marimba in Portland, OR; and Zuva Marimba, of Santa Fe.
Tariro sends a huge THANK YOU to all of the students, performers, and groups who continue to support our work educating and empowering young women in Zimbabwean communities affected by HIV/AIDS. We couldn’t do it without you!
October 11, 2011
From left to right, Grace, Sabine, Dion, and Lissa all finished high school with Tariro's support.
As promised, I’m following up on my first post detailing our successes in 2010, with more highlights from Tariro’s 2010 Annual Report. Today, I’d like to focus on Tariro’s psycho-social support services, designed to enable students to focus on moving beyond their challenges and obstacles, and working toward realizing their future goals.
In low-income neighborhoods such as Epworth and Highfield, Tariro's students live in extremely vulnerable households, with little access to basic resources
As teenaged girls in communities deeply affected by poverty and HIV/AIDS, our students are among the most vulnerable young people in Zimbabwe. In addition to coping with the death of one or both parents, our girls have to meet the daily challenges of living in neighborhoods with intermittent electricity and running water, and where average family incomes fall far below the poverty line. As Tariro’s program coordinator, Fadzi, writes in the Annual Report:
Many of Tariro’s parents and guardians are informally employed, and earning on average $50-$100 per month. Most guardians do not own the houses they live in; hence most are paying rentals, of between $50 and $100 per month. The average school fees for a Tariro student in day high school is $90-$100 per term. Whilst the school fees structures have become more stable, and parents are allowed to sign up for payment plans, the fees are very high relative to the incomes of most guardians. Additionally, some of the parents and guardians are taking care of more than 2 orphaned and vulnerable children (OVCs).
While paying school fees in enough to get a student back in school, offering students psycho-social support services is also essential in ensuring their success, by enabling them to work through underlying issues related to grief, loss, and abuse.
In 2010, Tariro’s psycho-social support services included:
Guidance counselor Peggy Samhaka speaks with Tariro students as part of our ongoing psycho-social support services
Tariro’s mentoring, counseling, and empowerment activities are critical in enabling our students to develop the motivation, confidence, and abilities to succeed.
Show your support for Tariro!
In the coming weeks, Tariro will begin raising money to support our students’ progress in 2012. As we move into our fall fundraising season, please consider making a donation to support our work. You can also join us on Facebook, and help spread the word about us to friends and family. Getting involved with Tariro is a wonderful way to make a difference in the lives of young women and girls in Zimbabwe!
September 17, 2011
Join Tariro on Saturday October 1st from 5-8pm at Friendly Street Church! The sliding scale for the event is $15-2o and it includes the dinner.
This is an event that we put on every year to raise money for our girls in Zimbabwe. All of the funds go to the girls that we sponsor who have lost parents to HIV/AIDS. The event will not only be fun but your presence will make a difference in a young girls life.
Location:
Friendly Street Church
2290 Friendly St
Eugene, OR
Ready for a fun event:
September 8, 2011
Filmed in 2009, this short clip shows students in Tariro’s traditional music and dance ensemble performing a rhythm called jukwa. They are accompanied by Tariro’s wonderful music and dance instructor, Daniel Inasiyo. Enjoy!
September 5, 2011
Who gets blamed for spreading HIV? The answer is often socially marginalized groups, that must fight to retain a voice.
This weeks blog post is Part 2 of Tariro intern Megan’s reflections on some of the larger issues in HIV/AIDS work. The first blog post in the series reviewed the history of AIDS, thirty years into the epidemic. This weeks post is going to look at how various social groups have experienced stigma, through being accused of transmitting HIV/AIDS throughout time.
Accusing the voiceless
Since the first case of AIDS was diagnosed in the early 1980’s people have been searching for the origins of the illness. In the process, blame and accusations have been directed towards certain groups, among them gay men, Haitians, Africans, and even chimpanzees.
Looking at these groups, there is a common theme that lies between all of them. The interesting trait that these groups have in common is that they have all experienced significant discrimination. For example, when the gay community started claiming visibility and rights with respect to sexual orientation, they were met with opposition and hatred from many different groups of people. Similarly, Haitians have been marginalized, and many of their cultural practices, including voodoo, have been misunderstood and misrepresented.
When AIDS started becoming visible as a epidemic, I argue that these groups were accused of spreading AIDS in part because they already had a history of marginalization and discrimination, making them less able to respond to the accusations against them. Cultural, sexual, or racial difference became a primary factor in determining accusations regarding the origins or transmission of HIV.
The example of Haiti
For example, Haitians were initially blamed for causing AIDS through voodoo practices. Even though there had never a been a link between voodoo practices and transmission of illnesses before, medical examiners immediately assumed that voodoo had to in some way connect to HIV. In the October 1983 edition of Annals of Internal Medicine, for example, physicians affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology related the details of a brief visit to Haiti and wrote, “It seems reasonable to consider voodoo practices a cause of the syndrome.” But it wasn’t just this one edition delivering this message. In fact, many physicians and medical boards were sending the message that Haitians voodoo practices could be a link to AIDS, without any evidence.
Looking towards the future
I hope you enjoyed part 2 to the three part blog post. The last part should be up sometime next week and is going to think through how to move on from debates about the origins of the epidemic, and the blame directed toward certain social groups, and toward a future free of the disease.
August 27, 2011
A group of Tariro students at Chembira school, in Glen Norah
Between finishing my dissertation, being hired as a faculty member at Eastman School of Music, and moving across the country, it’s taken me a long time to finish editing this year’s annual report! It is finally completed, and in the next few posts, I’m going to share some of the highlights of Tariro’s 2010 Annual Report with you. I’ll begin with highlights from our educational sponsorship program for girls in Zimbabwean communities affected by HIV/AIDS, which represents the central and most important aspect of our work. In subsequent posts, I’ll proceed to expand upon the pyscho-social support programs we provide for our sponsored students, as well as some of the highlights of the work done by our many volunteers in the United States, in support of our programs in Zimbabwe.
In 2010, Tariro provided comprehensive education support for 57 students, including 8 students enrolled in the last years of primary school, 46 students enrolled in high school, and 3 students attending university. This included 15 new students who were recruited into our programs to replace students who had finished high school in 2009. For all of our sponsored students, we covered educational expenses including tuition, student ID cards, uniforms, and school supplies.
Tariro's director Jennifer Kyker with Pauline K., Tariro's first university graduate!
Tariro is especially proud of the following accomplishments in 2010:
The dramatic results Tariro is able to achieve with our sponsored students are a result of intensive case management, including outreach activities at local schools, and regular monitoring of student progress via school and home visits. In addition, we provide a range of support services for our sponsored students, such as a lending library, our annual empowerment camp, and our traditional music and dance program. Highlights from these psycho-social support programs will
be the emphasis of my next post.
As we enter the fall fundraising season, please consider joining Tariro by making a donation, enabling us to continue making such a tremendous difference in the lives of our sponsored students. Thank you for your support!
August 9, 2011
A group of students wearing school uniforms purchased by Tariro
In this week’s post, we’re happy to share a report from our good friend Tess, who recently traveled to Zimbabwe, where she met many of our students, and took some great photos to share! Here is Tessa’s post:
This summer I spent just under a month in the Harare region of Zimbabwe. Thanks to a friend/dance teacher of mine, Jennifer Kyker Bangoura, I had amazing connections there, including her non-profit organization, Tariro.
Tariro does some of the most important work in Zimbabwe, as far as I’m concerned, sending at risk and/or orphaned adolescent girls to school. Studies show that sending a girl to school will make her 3 times less likely to contract HIV, and have the ability to earn 25% more income. What stands out to me the most is simply providing a platform for these girls to actually have some choice as to which direction their life may take.
By enabling young women to finish high school, Tariro gives them a future of hope!
In Zimbabwe, as a young woman, the options and opportunities are not nearly as abundant as they are for us here in America. For a young girl who is living with extended family, even sometimes taking care of all the younger and/or older ones, it’s much more difficult to finish one’s education and choose one’s own path in life. School needs to be paid for and often these families cannot afford to pay the fees. When this happens, the girls’ options are drastically reduced. In a culture where it is already somewhat difficult to escape gender specific expectations, without the opportunity of education, it becomes nearly impossible. Tariro currently supports over 60 girls. That is over 60 lives that are given an opportunity to fulfill dreams and live up to their full potential. Amazing!
A photo from Tessa's visit to Tariro's traditional dance rehearsal
Aside from paying school and uniform fees, Tariro also provides traditional music and dance for the girls. Every Saturday, the girls get together to practice. This includes marimba and magavhu (leg shaker) dances as well as marimba music and singing. What blew me away is how this type of tradition seems to live in them. It is their culture and Tariro sees the importance of keeping the culture and tradition alive. I had conversations with several Zimbabweans about the traditional culture being lost. It seems that tradition is no longer “cool” and the culture is becoming somewhat Americanized. It filled my heart with joy to see how the girls move and sing, with such grace. Their dance teacher, Daniel, is amazing and I officially had my butt whooped in my dance lessons with him!
The girls were shy, sweet, and talented. I cannot begin to say enough positive things about both Jennifer (founder) and Tafadzwa (program coordinator) and what powerful examples they are for these girls. As empowered, educated women in the world, they are doing good work and the girls get to see that and be inspired. I am inspired!
Tariro's program coordinator Fadzi with student Lissa K.
When looking for ways to give to make the most impact, please consider this organization. I have discovered that small, on the ground, grass roots organizations are doing the best work, where the money is going where it is most needed rather than the majority of it getting tied up in marketing and administrative costs. Having met these girls and seeing life in Zimbabwe has only made me more passionate about this cause and it’s importance. I can’t think of a more positive way to give and to change lives for the better.
Thanks so much to Tessa, for her powerful reflections on our work! Tessa also maintains a wonderful blog, where she has many other wonderful photos from her trip.
July 22, 2011
How has HIV/AIDS been understood in the northern hemisphere? One answer is found in Paul Farmer's work on HIV/AIDS in Haiti. (click on map for a close-up view)
AIDS is a global problem and there should be a global solution found by the entire international community. It is really scary to see and imagine our world fall into pieces because we refuse to share and put in the common vestiges of our civilizations. – Actress Sarah Polley speaks out on contamination, zombies, and AIDS
This weeks blog post, written by intern Megan Bauer, arose from conversations with the Tariro’s founder, Jennifer Kyker, over the past few months, and is Part 1 of a three-part discussion. Today’s post is going to discuss the history of AIDS and how it began, followed by a discussion of all the groups who have been accused of spreading it, and finally, a look toward the future.
AIDS and accusation
While talking to Jennifer, she asked me what I have learned and found the most interesting since I have started my internship. One of my answers was my surprise upon learning that the first diagnosed case of AIDS was in the United States, leading to our conversation about why, when people think of AIDS, their next thought is almost always about Africa.
Trying to understand why HIV/AIDS is coded as an African disease, Jennifer directed me a book called, “AIDS and Accusation: Haiti and the Geography of Blame”, written by Paul Farmer. The book tells the story of how, when AIDS first got attention in the 1980’s, many people looking for the origins of the virus initially laid blame on Haiti, suggesting that Haitian migrants to the United States, as well as American tourists in Haiti, were primarily responsible for spreading the virus.
Looking at the History of HIV/AIDS
According to avert.org, “The first recognized cases of AIDS occurred in the USA in the early 1980’s.” At this time there was not a name for the condition and physicians were not yet aware of what they were up against. “Several physicians in Los Angeles observed that Pneumocystis carinii, a harmless parasite to those with intact immune defenses, had caused pneumonia (P.C.P.) in several young men without recognized states of immunodeficiency” (Farmer 125). The Center for Disease Control (CDC) began monitoring the drug distributions and noticed that in five of the cases for men being treated with PCP in Los Angeles all of them were active homosexuals:
By the end of the summer in 1981, 108 cases of Kaposi’s sarcoma, (a form of Cancer), and unexplained opportunistic infections had been reported to the CDC. The vast majority of cases were from California and New York. Of those afflicted 107 were men; over 90 percent of these men stated that they were gay and sexually active. (Farmer 125)
When the idea of an epidemic began to surface, American health specialists began reviewing records and saw that “there had been unexpected clusterings of Kaposi’s sarcoma and opportunistic infections beginning in early 1977” (Farmer 125). Shortly after American specialists began noticing the unexpected clusterings Haitian physicians began seeing similar conditions of immunosuppression, leading to the detection of the first Haitian case of Kaposi’s sarcoma in June 1979 (Farmer 125).
Blaming Haiti
During this time fear of an epidemic began to surface, and the United States officially defined this unknown immunosuppression as AIDS. There were categorized symptoms that physicians in the United States had come to associate with the disease and these symptoms “were strikingly similar” to those that began showing up in the people of Haiti.
This is precisely the moment in time when the accusations began. Physicians of the United States began to claim that Haiti had the first case of HIV, and that the gay population from the United States brought it back to America after contracting it from male prostitutes in Haiti. People in the United States also made remarks that weren’t proven by science at all. For example, they perceived Haitians who practiced voodoo to be “rugged and gross individuals,” and suggested had participated in spreading the condition to the United States. From this point forward, tides of hate and blame began to intensify, leading the Haitian government to initiate a study entitled the Haitian Study Group on Kaposi’s Sarcoma and Opportunistic Infections (GHESKIO), to fight against these accusations.
The point of Farmer’s book is that since the beginning of time people have always looked for someone to blame, whether that group is Haitians, the gay community, or Africans. However, we may never know who had the very first case of AIDS, and the origins of the virus should not be our primary concern.
Moving forward
In next weeks post I am going to delve farther into the history of accusations, discuss various groups who have been accused of spreading the disease since the initial blame laid upon Haiti, in order to show readers that blame and accusations have never been consistent with respect to HIV/AIDS, but have put on changing groups of people throughout history. While people have often sought to blame someone for this terrible virus, however, its history remains unclear.
In the present, our job is to recognize that it doesn’t matter how the problem started- what matters is how we respond to HIV/AIDS right now. Tariro’s response is one of educating young women and girls, a population that is simultaneously at the highest risk for contracting the disease, and the group made most vulnerable through the effects of HIV/AIDS on their communities, as they loss parents, teachers, and other community leaders to the disease. Please join us in our work!
July 17, 2011
Tariro girls dance wearing traditional magavhu leg rattles
In today’s post, I’d like to share news from Tariro’s traditional music and dance ensemble. As my own personal history with Zimbabwean music led directly to the formation of Tariro, our traditional music and dance group is one of my favorite parts of our work. Weekly rehearsals, led by master dancer Daniel Inasiyo, provide our students with a space to develop confidence, self-esteem, and social networks with their peers, in addition to gaining practical skills as musicians and dancers. The traditional dance group has also led to great collaborative projects, such as our fundraising CD, Maungira EZimbabwe, as well as our ongoing partnership with the marimba group Hokoyo, in Eugene, OR.
Peer instruction is an important part of Tariro's traditional music and dance rehearsals
As our traditional music and dance group continues to develop, I’m happy to report that instructor Daniel Inasiyo recently shared some good news with us! First, we’re very pleased to announce that several of Tariro’s newly enrolled students, who joined us in 2011, have joined the group, infusing rehearsals with new energy! Several of these new students entered the group with a background in traditional music and dance, after having participated in an ensemble as part of their primary school education. We’re happy to have a new group of musicians and dancers sharing their skills and experience with the rest of the ensemble!
New participants in the ensemble include many students with previous experience in traditional music and dance
Second, our ensemble is now officially registered with the National Arts Council of Zimbabwe. Our official status at the arts council will assist us in working toward gaining recognition and visibility within Zimbabwe, as well as securing performance opportunities at cultural events, giving us a platform to share our wonderful work with other organizations and individuals in Zimbabwean civil society. Finally, Daniel also reports that he has ordered a new set of costumes for the group, to replace our old costumes, originally purchased in 2008. We can’t wait to share photos of the group in their new uniforms in the coming months!
The support Tariro receives from individuals, foundations, and organizations around the world is critical to our ability to offer this incredible empowerment program. Thanks again for your donations, which enable us to pay school fees for girls in Zimbabwean communities affected by HIV/AIDS, as well as offering extracurricular activities like the traditional music and dance group!
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