Radio Atipiri

According to organisers, there are other radio stations in the area, but they do not allow native languages like Quechua and Aymara to be spoken in their participative radio slots, as they do not understand them very well. In contrast, on Radio Atipiri people speak the language they choose. Tania Ayma, Director of CECOPI and Radio Atipiri, explains: "Children come and speak. Grandparents come and speak." In her words, "the station is a mix of information, music, different voices, all translated into a permanent radio production that recovers the oral memory of the Aymara culture, in educational kits of stories, miniprograms, educational messages, etc. Its programming is as varied as the people who come to share their voices and abilities. Radio Altipiri claims to be what the Altiplano community is: diverse and bilingual."

From its launch, Radio Atipiri has worked to assure gender equity in the right to communicate and to promote women's voices in the public sphere. The founders, male and female, are committed to giving voice to those who have least representation and receive least services from the conventional media outlets: the indigenous women of the Bolivian Altiplano, many of whom speak only their mother tongue, are not accustomed to speaking in public, and have low levels of formal education and literacy. In 2003, the station initiated skill building workshops for "women people's reporters"; they have trained an average of 200 women per year through the 4-month-long sessions. The reporters learn to interview their neighbours, write and edit articles, use broadcasting equipment, and transmit programmes onto the airwaves. Ayma relates the story of one woman reporter who travels the most distant areas of the city, where no public transport runs. Traveling on foot, she seeks to record the demands and the needs of the people.

The methodology of the workshops is based on the oral tradition, uses pictures rather than the written word, and is guided by personal testimonies and experiences. The elders of the region participate in programmes which promote the recovery of the people's oral memory; young people make hip-hop or rap programmes in Aymara; women write soap operas or act out dialogues that share their experiences in sexual and reproductive health, gender relations, and violence. The soap opera projects have been carried out through partnership with PCI-Media Impact. For example, "In a Woman's Name" is a soap with 20 episodes that talk about sexual rights, particularly the right to choose how many children to have. The motto is "the women of El Alto are in control of our bodies and we speak in our own voices."

Unable to offer salaries to the women reporters and other participants, Radio Atipiri initiated productive workshops to teach participants how to sew polleras, the skirts traditionally worn by women in the region. The skirts are sold to bolster household budgets and the project itself. According to organisers, the workshop is a space that not only allows the radio participants to earn income but gives them a space to "lose their fear, raise their voices, and record the voices of other women who live in a similar situation."

In addition to the radio programme, the CECOPI/Atipiri project has (as of June 2009) produced almost 50 films on topics chosen by people in the participating communities and suburbs. For instance, the youth of Radio Atipiri have made hip hop videos: "Hip hop comes from the United States. In El Alto, it's reworked. They take the rhythm, but the contents are about protesting, about sharing their lives, about their culture. Hip hop is a rhythm, a style to copy, but this is hip hop in Aymara. The music reflects these cultural contradictions, but in a strong expression of their own identity," Ayma points out.

Rights, Women, Media Development.

El Alto is a city legally and economically part of the Bolivian capital, but it is a settlement built by its residents - indigenous migrants from the countryside, miners, and workers from the city. While in 1950 it had a population of some 11,000, today the number nears one million. More than 80% of El Alto's population is indigenous, principally of the Aymara ethnicity. According to the 2001 census, 70% of residents are "poor, with basic needs unsatisfied," and thousands live in extreme poverty. According to organisers, the lack of transport, employment, services, education, and healthcare affects everyone, but the direct impact tends to be greater on women - who have historically been excluded from many cultural, social, and political spaces and have been taught to remain silent when faced with injustice.