By Farah Dabba
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The Clothesline Project is an annual event that campuses all over the country host. The project aims to raise awareness about the sad realities of domestic and sexual violence and to help victims express their emotions about their personal experiences through a different medium, while knowing they are not alone. The way the project achieves these goals is by letting victims decorate t-shirts and then hang them up on a clothesline all throughout campus.
The idea behind the t-shirts and the clothesline comes from the history that laundry is often looked at as “women’s work,” and women from close-knit neighborhoods would regularly discuss things while hanging their laundry out to dry. A small group of women started the first Clothesline Project in Hyannis, Massachusetts in October of 1990. That original project saw 31 shirts on display during the annual “Take Back the Night” march and rally. Now, the official Clothesline website states there is an estimation of 500 Clothesline Projects happening nationally and internationally and estimated 500,000 to 600,000 shirts being made.
The UMKC Women’s Center has been partaking in the Clothesline Project for several years now, and it has only grown. We are excited to organize this event each year and look forward to the impact it will have on the campus as well as the hopeful support it provides the survivors. This year the event will be on October 1st from 9am-5pm. It will be held on the UMKC Quad area, which is located at 52nd and Rockhill Rd. Students and faculty can come to the Women’s Center and decorate a t-shirt and hang it up on the clothesline as well as gain some information about the Women’s Center and the services we offer. This year’s Clothesline Project is the first event to kick off the first day of domestic violence awareness month! Come out and see us!
Source: http://www.clotheslineproject.org/