Thousands of Rhodes students and staff, along with members of the Grahamstown community, gather each year and march the streets in the annual RU Silent Protest. This year the Silent Protest, an annual event since 2007, has a new organiser.
Thousands of Rhodes students and staff, along with members of the Grahamstown community, gather each year and march the streets in the annual RU Silent Protest. This year the Silent Protest, an annual event since 2007, has a new organiser.
Kim Barker, a post-doctoral student in the Rhodes psychology department is the new co-ordinator, following the departure of former Student Services Officer, Larissa Klazinga.
“When I first came across the protest, it drew me on so many different levels,” Barker said. “I was struck by how it seemed to facilitate a shift for survivors of sexual violence.”
For Barker, the Silent Protest has formed a crucial part of her PhD research over the past three years. Interviews were conducted with survivors on their experience of participating in the protest.
“Many [research participants]used the protest almost year on year as part of their healing process,” Barker said.
Barker, together with the Rhodes Gender Action Forum (GenAct), lobbied last year for the protest to remain an annual event. She is organising it for Rhodes Student Affairs as an independent contractor.
“We hope to grow the Silent Protest into an ongoing programme of events which opens up dialogue around gender, violence and relationships,” Barker said. “We organised the ‘Love and Violence’ talk as one way of responding to Amanda Tweyi’s murder, but we would be keen to explore work with men and expand into schools as well.”
The event is regarded as the largest protest against rape and sexual violence in South Africa and aims to show solidarity with people who are silenced by sexual violence.
The protest is scheduled to take place on Friday, 1 August from 6am at Alec Mullins Hall and ends at 8pm, when participants gather for the 'Take Back the Night' March from the Cathedral to the Rhodes campus. Participants may also attend events leading up to the march – a briefing for survivors on 26 July and a talk by rape survivors Andy Kawa and Dave Luis on Wednesday 30 July.
Find the Silent Protest on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/731250190226108/?ref=70
Twitter: https://twitter.com/RUSilent
Visit the website for more information: http://www.ru.ac.za/studentaffairs/resources/silentprotest/
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