Access to Information Archives - Translators without Borders Blog

Support women change-makers with TWB

We believe in celebrating women every day – because inclusion and rights are essential to creating a better, more equal, and sustainable world. This year, on International Women’s Day, we’re excited to spotlight and say thanks to the powerful women who make up two-thirds of our TWB Community! Together, this incredible global community of language volunteers translates millions of words to accelerate progress and inclusion. Committed to giving their time and sharing their skills, they’re helping marginalized people including other women and girls to get vital information and be heard.

In northeast Nigeria, where thousands of people are displaced by conflict, our research shows that access barriers exclude sections of the population from vital communications and even aid. Women, marginalized language speakers, and people living with disabilities face particular difficulties getting the information they need and being heard. Read on to learn how we work with local humanitarians to ensure they’re informed about affected people’s language use and can offer accessible channels to reach even the most marginalized groups.

We know from decades of experience that we can bridge the gaps between affected communities and responders by more routinely communicating and listening in a wider range of languages and formats. That’s where the TWB Community comes in. Our Nigerian-language-speaking community members translate critical information and resources. This blog looks at how we are helping to increase access and trust in the country’s camps for internally displaced people.

Join us as we share some remarkable stories of women in our TWB Community who advocate for women’s rights and language access. From amplifying voices to breaking down barriers, their experiences inspire us all to create inclusive and empowering spaces. It’s time to act: and it starts with listening. When we meet women’s and girls’ language and communication needs and create resources that work for everyone, we can make real, inclusive change.

How language unites women to tell their stories

In this heartfelt narrative, Peace Nkasiobi Agbo, an Igbo speaker and TWB Community member from Nigeria shares her journey of resilience and determination. In many parts of the globe, women and girls navigate constraints on their futures, their education, their rights as women, and their own sexual and reproductive health. Our community members translate critical information and resources, helping people get answers, know their rights, and be heard. From challenging stereotypes to advocating for linguistic diversity, Peace’s story resonates deeply with our mission.

Peace, Nkasiobi Agbo, TWB Community member

About Peace, Nkasiobi Agbo, Igbo speaker in Nigeria.

“Peace, Nkasiobi Agbo is my name. I am from Eastern Nigeria, Enugu State specifically, a place known for its brown earth and hilly landscape. We speak the Igbo language, a variety slightly different from central Igbo. People are often surprised when I speak my language because they wonder how I can speak so fluently even though I was not born in my state of origin and never grew up there. I grew up in the Southern part of Nigeria and they are multilingual. I attribute my ability to speak, read, and write in my mother tongue to my gregarious nature, strong curiosity, and versatility. I am a fast learner, who pays attention to detail and is open to new experiences.”

Investing in education for all – women, girls, and marginalized language speakers

“Girls typically receive little or no educational investment from their family as there is a cultural belief that they’re bound to leave home one day to their husband’s house where they will be useful. So why invest? However, my parents were of a different school of thought and would cut down on luxuries to ensure we had quality education. So fortunately, despite living in an environment that expects female children to be subservient, I went to good schools and competed with my male counterparts as a child.”

“As a girl, you are not limited and you have a voice. Use it and stand/speak up.”
Peace Nkasiobi Agbo, TWB Community member

“Growing up, it was clear to me that women were not supposed to aspire too high because it could potentially intimidate men. Too much education and too much societal affluence for a woman was ‘not good.’ Anyway, in 2014, I was accepted into a university to study English and Literary Studies. 90% of my coursemates were female – there were stereotypes about studying languages. Despite studying languages, most people thought it impolite to correct someone’s grammar. So, while speaking with anyone, I was conscious of not using a high-sounding vocabulary in case I appeared too proud or intimidating. Nevertheless, speaking my mother tongue alone hindered effective communication as my environment was multilingual. So, the English language inevitably became my main language of communication.”

Hope for women and girls’ rights

“I have always wished I could access all information in my mother language but that is like asking everyone in the world to learn to speak my mother tongue. To date, language barriers have strengthened exclusion. People like me have lost opportunities – because I am from the Igbo-speaking tribe. A tribe that is stereotyped to be proud, domineering, and very zealous – sometimes in the wrong way. This false stereotype puts people on the defensive once you mention your tribe. However, my language connects me to my ancestral roots and tells a strong of great men and women who fought for my country’s independence.”

“I have a one-year-old daughter who understands the Igbo language more than any other language and it’s often mesmerizing how people worry that she may never learn to speak English, even though her mother is an English language major. It is important to me that I build her confidence and teach her my mother language which is a major part of her identity. Also learning English is another way for her to develop her ability to master other languages. As a girl, you are not limited and you have a voice. Use it and stand/speak up.”

Untold stories – women can break language barriers

“I have had the privilege to teach English Language to a class of over 200 girls. I shared their struggles and ability to express themselves in the English language. A lot of these girls had untold stories and experiences waiting to be penned. The pain of being a girl and the fear of being married off once they are done with secondary school lingered in the minds of some of these girls. It is part of my desire that young girls can express themselves in their language, and tell their stories without fear or worry about how they tell it and in what language. We can break language barriers.”

Improving access and trust in northeast Nigeria

Our sociolinguistic research offers specific, localized insights into communication barriers

and the intersectional, compounding role of language in marginalization.

Marginalized groups including women in conflict-affected northeast Nigeria face specific challenges accessing information and being heard:

54% of affected people and humanitarians consulted said that speakers of marginalized languages don’t get information directly.
Religious and cultural barriers prevent many women from attending meetings, and from speaking freely when they do. Female focus group participants say they depend on their husbands, in-laws, and neighbors for information.
People are not able to get the information they need if they cannot read, or cannot read well: literacy levels are low in northeast Nigeria, particularly among women. Participants expressed a preference for information with little text.
Speakers of marginalized languages often cannot get information in their language, as humanitarians typically communicate in the dominant language of the camp, typically Hausa or Kanuri. Speakers of Fulfulde/Fulani, Marghi, Glavda, Mandara, Gamargu, and Shuwa face particular problems and rely on relatives, friends, and neighbors to interpret for them.
There is no consistent provision for sign language users. Deaf people in the camps rely on family and friends to get information and to help them make complaints or give feedback.

“I called the hotline and they spoke in English so I dropped the call.”
Young female FGD participant, Gwoza

Unequal challenges for women are echoed around the world. CLEAR Global provides guidance and supports humanitarian organizations to address language issues and expand information access. Specifically in northeast Nigeria we recommend that responders:

Use multiple channels to share information with the widest possible audience, including multilingual audio messaging, loudspeakers for community leaders to relay information, and print materials with field-tested graphics and limited text.
Expand and strengthen listening – such as radio listening programs and effective two-way complaints and feedback systems to enable responders to listen to affected communities’ concerns.
Communicate in the languages of camp residents, including relevant sign languages, and provide interpreters with training; use plain language for everyone to understand.

From simple translated documents to localized pictorials, videos, and chatbots – solutions must be in the right language, and they must work for women.

Support women’s rights with TWB and CLEAR Global

Let’s unite to speak up for women’s rights, promote access for all, and embrace the richness of language diversity. By listening to and investing in women, we can inspire inclusion together.

With the TWB community of over 100,000 language volunteers, CLEAR Tech’s AI language solutions, and CLEAR Insights’ research and partnerships, we are set to improve global communication and information access.

Learn more about what we do.

Become a nonprofit partner to get:

Language services including written and audio translation, terminology support, pictorial messaging, plain language review, sign languages, and more
In-person and remote training to strengthen your translation and interpreting capacity and skills like plain language to improve communication in emergencies
Specific language guidance, data, analysis and tools for an evidence-driven understanding of what works for the most marginalized.
Opportunities to collaborate on global multilingual resources like written, audio and video glossaries to support PSEA and COVID-19 response.

Or join the TWB Community today

Provide language support to local and global nonprofit organizations
Contribute to making information accessible, inclusive, and useful to people who need vital information in their language. Learn more.

Recently featured:

Olena on why she volunteers as a humanitarian translator, supporting her community in a crisis, and e-learning to grow her skills.
Celebrating linguistic diversity and mother languages, TWB Community members Okafor and Chinwendu embrace the power of language to make access to information on education, health, and climate change more equal.

Tell your story

Have you overcome language challenges or helped promote women’s rights with the TWB Commnity?

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I was exhausted. It had been a great week in Bangladesh, but the overload of language, smells, refugee camp, seeing old friends, meeting new friends, government, donors, and all the while pretending like I wasn’t jetlagged, was taking its toll. I just wanted to go to sleep.

My last meeting was in Dhaka with someone in the Prime Minister’s office. I had little hope of staying awake through the meeting.

And yet, I was captivated.

The literacy rate in Bangladesh is considered low (72.8% according to UNESCO in 2016) but is just below the global average. Literacy among women is lower (69.9%); but, in general, the majority of the people have at least basic literacy skills. There is 90 percent mobile phone penetration and 96 percent mobile internet access. The International Mother Language Institute, the body in Bangladesh that supports the promotion, spread, and preservation of Bangla languages, says that 41 languages are spoken in the country, only five of which have written scripts. In the humanitarian response for Rohingya refugees in Cox’s Bazar, Translators without Borders (TWB) finds the situation particularly difficult. Rohingya has no agreed written script. Very few of the refugees can read and write, there are few people who speak Rohingya and anything else well. Add to this mix low radio coverage – not only do the Rohingya not have radios, even if they did there is not even radio coverage in parts of the camps, and about one million people living in poor and difficult conditions that speak many different dialects and you begin to understand why communicating effectively is difficult.

It’s vitally important that there is two-way communication between the people – refugees and local Bangladeshis – and the government and aid workers. Take the issue of the coming monsoon. The formal and makeshift refugee camps have sprouted up all over the Cox’s Bazar district, an area that includes a national park and lush forest. But now the trees have been torn down to make room for shelters and for firewood. This makes the soil very unstable and dangerous, with monsoon rains promising huge mud pits and the possibility of landslides. It is also a hilly area; tents are built on the sides of hills that will become slippery and unstable with heavy rains and wind. Refugees, as well as local residents, need to know where to go, what to do if there’s an emergency, how to get help for those needing medical attention, and what to do if food gets swept away.

The challenges abound. The digital world seems a world away.

And yet, enter Dr. Jami. In a buzzy, busy office with a high level of excitement and a relatively good gender balance, I was suddenly in the middle of a high tech environment. Dr. Jami launched directly into what he wanted us to know and do.

Dr. Jami runs the Access to Information (A2I, inevitably) project in the Prime Minister’s office. The aim is to help the people of Bangladesh quickly and easily get information on public services. One of A2I’s projects is the digitization of government institutions; they have developed over 1,000 key government websites. Dr. Jami is not a language guy (he’s a solutions architect), but he proceeds to tell me quickly that Bangla was only standardized in Unicode five years ago, so there is very little data available from which to build good translation engines. While there’s 90 percent mobile phone penetration, in 2018 GSMA estimated that only 28-30 percent of those were smartphones. Yet, 96 percent of internet access is via phones. Whaaa? How does that work? It’s also startling how little desktops and laptops are used to access the internet.

I asked a taxi driver, who was using a smartphone, if he used his phone for the internet. He replied, “No, but I use it for Facebook.”

There are no data charges for Facebook in Bangladesh – unless you want to see videos or pictures. Internet use is Facebook and Facebook is only text. Those who are illiterate, or only barely literate, won’t have smartphones.

To Dr. Jami, who needs more people to have smartphones to help ensure they can get access to information, the cost is not the barrier: There are very inexpensive smartphones in Bangladesh. He believes it is fear of technology, which he believes is associated with illiteracy. To reach his goal of migrating 70 percent of the current mobile phone users to smartphones, he must address fear.

Language is an issue. With a population of over 157 million people, and one of the most widely spoken languages in the world, you’d think that the language technology for Bangla would be outstanding. It’s not. That’s surprising. And without that technology, equipping 1,000 websites with dynamic information in Bangla is nearly impossible, not to mention making them interactive and/or adding audio.

The work that A2I is doing is globally relevant, of course. Other countries are already seeking their support to bring better access to information to their people. He mentions that they are already working in South Sudan – which has the 2nd lowest literacy rate in the world. Again, the language barrier is huge. And, again, there is little digital language data.

Dr. Jami has heard of TWB’s Gamayun project – can we help? Can we be a neutral broker to bring together the limited language data out there and leverage our knowledge of language and the language industry to help Bangladeshis get access to information about basic services?

Dr. Jami and the TWB team will continue this conversation – there are still many questions to be asked and answered. But I was impressed by the enthusiasm and the accomplishments of his team. And I am really excited to see where Dr. Jami and other countries take this exciting initiative.

Written by Translators without Borders' Executive Director Aimee Ansari. This article was also published on HuffPost UK.

Read a related post on The #LanguageMatters blog, ‘Language: Our Collective Blind Spot in the Participation Revolution’. In TWB’s last blog post, Executive Director Aimee Ansari explains why we need to create and disseminate a global dataset on language and communication for crisis-affected countries.

Tag: Access to Information

Women’s rights and language access