Despite some participants being fatigued from the challenges of the formal job search, some have used their newly acquired skills to volunteer and help in their communities in hopes of maintaining their knowledge and establishing a professional track record in the local market. In doing so, women are utilizing their resources and skills to find new avenues to succeed in non-traditional employment. The increased presence of women in non-traditional places of work undoubtedly serves to normalize the image of women in these spaces and ultimately shifts perceptions. However, until women’s employment in new workforces is normalized, women’s safety is in question. During discussions with SIHA staff on the anxieties surrounding women’s safety as they break through gender stereotypes, Wafa Adam commented:
“There is power in women holding tools. I believe that women who are holding these tools will be less prone to sexual harassment. Women who are comfortably and confidently participating in non-stereotypical spaces can intimidate men.”45
Wafa speaks of the symbolic power of women holding and handling tools traditionally used by men in spaces traditionally occupied by men. In other words, by holding tools, women are summoning dominant gendered norms and are deliberately confronting and resisting them. This is not to say that women who occupy male-dominated spaces can easily bypass sexual harassment in this way. Rather, it speaks to the power of women’s resilience and willingness to defy gender stereotypes, and how this disrupts patriarchy.
MAINTAINING MOMENTUM, SECURING FEMINIST FUTURES The responses of interviewed men of varying professional backgrounds (teachers, government officials, mechanic shop owners) concerning the question of women’s employment in maledominated sectors reveal a theme of conditional acceptance. One interviewee noted, “It is acceptable if it is undertaken in ways that do not harm their femininity seeing as often, women take on more masculine attitudes to survive.”46 Respondents addressed the so-called ‘dangers’ of women who must compromise their femininity in order to assimilate and protect themselves in such places as the industrial area. While accepting of women’s vocational employment, which indicates a shift in gender stereotypes, men insist that a woman’s femininity not be
45
FGD, Khartoum, SIHA Staff, February 6th, 2020
46
FGD, Khartoum, Vocational Training Staff, February 7th, 2020
Negotiating Space: Sudanese Women’s access to Vocational Education & Employment
Page No. 26
