The title of this recording is "Farida Sultana - Decolonise Your Minds hui". It was recorded in Ponsonby Community Centre, 20 Ponsonby Terrace, Ponsonby, Auckland on the 5th February 2012. Farida Sultana is presenting.  Their name is spelt correctly but may appear incorrectly spelt later in the document. The duration of the recording is 15 minutes, but this may not reflect the actual length of the proceedings. A list of correctly spelt content keywords and tags can be found at the end of this document. A brief description of the recording is: In this podcast Farida gives a keynote presentation at the hui. The content in the recording covers the 2010s decade. A brief summary of the recording is: In a thought-provoking keynote presentation at the Decolonise Your Minds hui in Auckland, Farida Sultana shared insights from their journey and perception of the world. Recorded on February 5th, 2012, Sultana began by reflecting on their initial encounter with feminism in 1991 during a visit to a women's refuge in the UK. At the time, Sultana did not fully comprehend the feminist discussions but later came to understand their own feminist leanings when called out by Māori women in Hamilton, New Zealand. While Sultana had not perceived themself as a feminist, others recognized feminism in their work and approach to life. An anecdote about being advised to "polish it down" when running for election points to the broader societal reluctance to embrace feminist ideals. Sultana's response highlights frustration with the expectation that one conform to societal norms rather than challenge them. Sultana emphasized the importance of not diluting one's beliefs to fit in, especially if doing so could hinder progress for future generations. Reflecting on their past, Sultana recounted the unrecognized feminist actions of their aunts who defied societal norms in a Bangladeshi village and lived independently. Despite warnings from their mother to not emulate the aunts, Sultana found inspiration in their trailblazing ways. Sultana detailed the foundation of Shakti organization in New Zealand which was established 15 years prior, born from a critical need for services for immigrant and refugee women, such as English language learning and support in coping with domestic violence. Sultana discussed the difficulties these women faced confronting patriarchal structures both within their communities and culturally insensitive institutions. The necessity of the organization became apparent when discussions surrounding domestic violence arose, highlighting the systemic issues these women faced. Through personal stories, Sultana illustrated how the designation of 'other' exacerbated the challenges faced by ethnic minorities. The speech mentioned the detrimental effects of institutional racism, citing how the prevalence of key issues such as mental health struggles and discrimination in the workplace is often ignored. The speaker concluded with a powerful call to action, urging people not to ignore racism, but to confront it head-on to pave the way for the next generation's progress. As an example, Sultana shared the story of a friend's daughter who, having grown up around feminist dialogue, chose to engage in activism herself. Sultana's earnest appeal to the younger generation was to recognize the struggles and stand firm against societal pressures to conform. The speech left an impact, advocating that the battle for equality should continue, even if it means facing obstacles at every turn. This presentation not only touched upon themes of feminism, activism, domestic violence, family, and immigration but also carried an underlying message of the importance of inclusivity, challenging existing norms, and striving for change. The original recording can be accessed at pridenz. com and is also archived at the Alexander Turnbull Library in Wellington, New Zealand. The full transcription of the recording follows.  It includes timestamps every thirty seconds in the format [HH:MM:SS].  The transcription begins:  Um I thought I talk a little bit about my own experience and the way I see the world in my eyes, and it might be boring if it is boring. Please feel free to fall asleep. And if it is not boring, then keep your eyes open and and if you shut your ear if you want Um, I think it was, um 1991 when [00:00:30] as a client, I went to women's refuge in the UK. I first attended a for for feminist women and I thought, Wow, it's so cool. Um, I was a young mother with, um with a young daughter for me was, um it was bigger. Picture was abuse. I didn't link the abuse with, um anything else. And I thought, um, it was luxury to have [00:01:00] a day not working and sitting around talking about a whole lot of things and trust me, half the thing I didn't even understand at that time. Um, And after many years, when um, there was a in Hamilton, a few Maori women called me feminist. I thought What? They're probably talking about someone else. And I remember national collective CEO. She pulled me from my back and said they're talking about you. I said, Wow. [00:01:30] What did I do for a minute? Um, I thought being feminist, you have to be somebody that was in my mind. You have to be out of spoken. You have to write. You have What I was doing is was what needed to be done in front of my life circle. And basically it was coping mechanism. What do you cope with? The situation throws into you and, um later on, I asked one of my friends, You know, they called [00:02:00] me feminist today. My friend said This is good or bad. I said, I have no idea. Since then Um, there was many things I did and it got attached My close friends who know, uh the way I live, the way I think they always tell me that you are not only feminist, you are radical feminist, but polish it down because our community is not ready. [00:02:30] Even when I stood for election, I remember my advisor within the party told me polish it down further because the community is not ready. My question is, how long to polish it down? You can polish it down. You can dress according to the society. You can walk according to the society. But how long? How many of my generation is over? As I told you, IM. Um um [00:03:00] middle age, mature age. But I don't want Sasha or people like yourself to polish it down, because if you polish it down, it is going to remain down. That piece of advice, I don't know. I call it feminist or radical feminist, but I feel that needed to happen. The community is not ready unless we are ready to challenge it. When I was writing the book reflecting back [00:03:30] in my, um, young age, I realised a couple of my aunties were feminist. Maybe they didn't know they are feminist. They worked out on their marriage. They did farming by themselves. They didn't bring up their Children. They used to go and challenge community leaders. Um, I had a lot of those challenges. Then I looked back and, um, I feel now maybe there wasn't. In theory, [00:04:00] they didn't have a workshop, but they live their life as a feminist, which they were stigmatised by the rest of the family members. Um, when I grew up, my mother always told me not to be like my aunties. Always do not sit like your aunties. Do not eat like your aunties. Do not talk like your aunties. When I cut my hair short, my mother told me. Now there is nowhere to stop. You even cut your hair. So my aunties had [00:04:30] a very short hair and that's not common in Bangladeshi village, I said. My hair fall. My mother said, Whatever it is, but you shouldn't have cut it short. But my mother lived with it. Bless my mother. She's lived with that. What? I've probably given her enough to her. She lived with that, but, um, that's where it is. The moment you step out of the circle is going to be a challenge, and it is an individual challenge or it is a challenge. As a group, [00:05:00] I feel looking at the young people. You are blessed to have each other when the challenge come like, um, like myself. I didn't I had my friends who actually feminist, but they wouldn't act like a feminist because they had to. They had to, uh, confirm the society, Um, a 67 other women who started with me if I look back and if some of you probably don't [00:05:30] know Shati organisation started 15 years ago in New Zealand. We started, um because there was a large number of immigrant women who came to New Zealand and refugee women. But there wasn't a place where these women could go simply learn English language, uh, communicate with each other how they're coping with the new country. Um, usually community organisation, they have their, um, association or societies, [00:06:00] which is, um, man does everything they have a token woman in the committee which would be cultural secretary, or or or or probably cooking secretary. Uh, the rest of the work will be done by the, um, men sitting in the table, including ethnic, um, council. Some of you probably know about ethnic council. Uh, but the women will be making tea in the kitchen. That's their contribution, right? [00:06:30] That gets done in the kitchen. Um, the most of the work will be done by the men in the front. And this was a platform where women could sit down and talk and learn English, get get to know each other. But there are unfortunate circumstances. Um, I think we had a couple of sessions, Um, without domestic violence. Then we got into domestic violence. The women were abused who came and talked about it. We had to set up an organisation [00:07:00] to deal with that. Not that we knew what we setting up. But we set up our organisation to deal with that. And I believe all of my friends who stepped out and helped us to set up organisation. They all are feminist in their heart. But how many of them could have been challenged coming out? They probably gone, Had a lot of a lot of domestic violence going on in their house because all of a sudden, their wives going out, [00:07:30] spending time, learning, driving, doing things, telling their husband this is not right. This is wrong. But some of the marriages cope. Some of the marriages did not cope because of the through the process. Some of them has made a personal sacrifice, um, to keep the organisation and our vision going that other women could get help. Um, but, uh but then do I look back and say, because they didn't cut their hair short? They are not [00:08:00] feminist. No, I think they are also feminist and one of my Yeah, true. At least you were laughing. One of my friends, um who, um, who, uh, founding member of, um, her daughter joined newest venture, which is a new office in Melbourne. Um, and, um, her daughter just [00:08:30] finished degree in psychology. She joined the group and this girl whom I saw, uh, half the time working around, um, this size. And now she grown up. Um, she was sitting in a meeting and talking to the other women about feminism and how we should not stand. We should stand against violence. We shouldn't be tolerating violence. And when she finished, I asked, My friend is that that is [00:09:00] her name. Is that your daughter who is stopping? She says, yes. That's what we did. Maybe I didn't change my outlook, but I made sure that she do. And that's what, as a mother as we can do, um, the challenges that, um, we jointly faced in New Zealand. You know how, um when we came here, we learn a lot about, uh, [00:09:30] culturalism. And I think, um, hundreds of meeting over the years I sat there and the 10 15 years ago. What was now probably a lot better. I said. There there's a, um, discuss bicultural discussion. Then you sit there and think, Do I fit anywhere? Nobody could see that I'm sitting here. Nobody could even think that I can contribute something, even though my English is not probably perfect. But [00:10:00] I can also think. And then at some point you try to push yourself and contribute a little bit. And then when the minute gets done, if you don't reflect on at all in the and it went on for a very, very long time, and it's still probably going to go on because the acknowledgement of the other people, which is other [00:10:30] Lucia, one of our founding member, always gets really upset. When you take things and you take other, she said, we always going to be other. Um, then you take other and, um, other people problem will remain. Other group people problem if you've seen that. Just, uh, last weekend there was a quite a lot of talk in the media with Dominion Post and, um, Michael Lloyd actually called the ethnic community man. Monkey monkey should go back to the [00:11:00] monkey land. Um, the, um then Sasha got all prepared when in, uh, breakfast news to defend her organisation. We're talking about another 15 years. How long this issue is going to be. Other people issues monkeys issues. Monkeys should go back to monkey land. Unless people from here stand up and you talk about it. Talk about institutional racism, which is more [00:11:30] dangerous than you see racist people on the road who throw things to you. Who wants to beat you up? That at least you could see. At least you can feel it. You can You can take a stick or do something about it. But But what do you do when, uh, politely people thank you in your face and say I had so many letters. Thank you. There [00:12:00] is no allocation of allocation of fund for migrant and refugee community. Why do you thank me for that? I don't need a thank you. You could hear instead of thank you. You would say Just get lost. We have no money for you. That would have been much big way of explaining other than say thank you. There is no money for you. Your problem doesn't exist because it doesn't matter. Even the suicide rate is after [00:12:30] Maori, the highest suicide rate in Auckland District Health Board 2007 and eight. It was, um, migrant young people. It doesn't matter. Even you dying in breast cancer because it's not detected because there is not enough female, um, female interpreters of support that could reach it Doesn't matter if you get a job and get paid less. It doesn't matter if you work three times harder than the white organisation [00:13:00] and they can still put you down. It doesn't matter because you don't exist. You stay in the box of others. Hey, then, uh, then this this generation of, uh, mid-twenties people, some of you will come out and challenge it, and some of you will try not to see it. Because if you don't see it, it's much nicer [00:13:30] because then you can fit in as a you can just sit in. My daughter works in the media I. I often tell my daughter, Don't turn up to be a banana. Then your mother cannot take the shock. Yeah, just stay brown. Be proud of to be brown. My daughter [00:14:00] tells me, Mom, there's the two things. If you see a racism, you need to fight for it. If you don't see a racism and you know there is a racism, then you learn to stand up much easier. I don't know if that theory works, but some young people might take that theory because they want to be fit into, um, basically, um, white, um, middle aged male corporate because you need to fit in to make money, to [00:14:30] pay your bill, bring up your Children. But the moment you start seeing it, then you get hurt. You get angry, you get frustrated and you need to do something about it. But I maybe me, I feel go down to that road because at least you're changing something for your next generation. I don't know if I made a huge difference or not, but I tried last 15, 16 years, every day, make a little [00:15:00] difference for my daughter and granddaughter and for everybody else. I think that's what I'm going to do. If I leave up to 90 I'll do it in the restroom, too. Thank you very much. The full transcription of the recording ends. A list of keywords/tags describing the recording follow. These tags contain the correct spellings of names and places which may have been incorrectly spelt earlier in the document. The tags are seperated by a semi-colon: 2010s ; Auckland ; English language ; Farida Sultana ; Hamilton ; Hawaii ; Job ; Melbourne ; Māori ; People ; People of Colour Decolonisation Hui ; Women's Refuge ; abuse ; activism ; advice ; board ; cancer ; change ; children ; collective ; coming out ; community ; cooking ; council ; difference ; domestic violence ; face ; family ; farming ; feminism ; friends ; fun ; hair ; health ; hui ; immigration ; individual ; institutional racism ; justice ; language ; love ; marriage ; media ; news ; other ; podcast ; psychology ; queen ; racism ; refugee ; religion ; suicide ; time ; violence ; women ; work ; workshop ; writing. The original recording can be heard at this website https://www.pridenz.com/dym_farida_sultana.html. The master recording is also archived at the Alexander Turnbull Library in Wellington, New Zealand.  For more details visit their website https://tiaki.natlib.govt.nz/#details=ecatalogue.1089207. Please note that this document may contain errors or omissions - you should always refer back to the original recording to confirm content.