Mrs. Goundo’s Daughter

On Saturday May 12 at 6 pm, MQA will host a film screening of Mrs. Goundo’s Daughter. The film was produced by humanist filmmakers Barbara Attie and Janet Goldwater of Attie & Goldwater Productions.

Following the screening, MQA will host a Q & A with our friend Sandeep, who works with International Planned Parenthood and worked on this film.

The following is the film’s description which I pulled from here at Attie & Goldwater Productions.

MRS. GOUNDO’S DAUGHTER is the story of a young mother’s quest to keep her baby daughter healthy and whole. It is also the story of the African tradition of female genital cutting, which dates back thousands of years—and how it affects people’s lives in just two of the many places where the practice is being debated today.

Mrs. Goundo’s husband fled drought and ethnic conflict in his native Mali, West Africa sixteen years ago. Mrs. Goundo came to the United States in 1999. Together, they are raising three young children in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

To stay in the U.S., Mrs. Goundo must persuade an immigration judge that her two-year old daughter Djenebou, born in the U.S., will almost certainly suffer clitoral excision if Goundo is deported. In Mali, where up to 85% of women and girls are excised, Mrs. Goundo and her husband are convinced they would be powerless to protect their daughter from her well-intentioned grandparents, who believe all girls should be excised.

MRS. GOUNDO’S DAUGHTER bridges Mrs. Goundo’s two worlds. In a Malian village, we see 62 girls, six months to ten years old, preparing to be excised just as their mothers, sisters, aunts and grandmothers were before them. The girls are warned they must be brave and not cry, although, as one mother tells us: “The pain is very deep. There is nothing we can do to lessen it.” We hear Malian activists fighting to end the practice, and traditionalists who defend it. We see its deep roots in the largely Islamic culture.

Tags: Female genital mutilation, FGM, film screening, Mrs. Goundo's Daughter, Philadelphia