Efua Dorkenoo | |
|---|---|
 Efua Dorkenoo, January 2014 | |
| Born | 6 September 1949 |
| Died | 18 October 2014 (aged 65) |
| Other names | Stella Efua Graham |
| Education | Wesley Girls' High School |
| Alma mater | London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine City University London |
| Occupation(s) | Activist, campaigner against female genital mutilation |
| Known for | Foundation for Women's Health, Research and Development (FORWARD) |
| Spouse(s) | Freddie Green, Bernard Dotse Dorkenoo |
| Children | 2 sons |
Efua Dorkenoo, OBE (6 September 1949 – 18 October 2014), affectionately known as "Mama Efua",[1] was a Ghanaian-British campaigner against female genital mutilation (FGM) who pioneered the global movement to end the practice[2] and worked internationally for more than 30 years to see the campaign "move from a problem lacking in recognition to a key issue for governments around the world."[3]
She was born in Cape Coast, Ghana, where she attended Wesley Girls' High School.[4] She moved to London at the age of 19 to study nursing, and eventually earned a master's degree at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and a research fellowship at City University London.[5] She was a staff nurse at various hospitals, including the Royal Free,[4] and it was while training as a midwife that she became aware of the impact of FGM on women's lives.[1][6]
She joined the Minority Rights Group and travelled to various parts of Africa to gather information for what was one of the earliest reports published on FGM in 1980.[1] In 1983 she founded the Foundation for Women's Health, Research and Development (FORWARD), a British NGO that supports women who have experienced FGM and tries to eliminate the practice.[7][8] She began working with the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1995 and was the acting director for women’s health there until 2001.[5][9][10] She was Advocacy Director and, subsequently, Senior FGM Advisor for Equality Now (an international human rights organization).[5] She was close friends with Alice Walker, advising on and featured in the documentary film Warrior Marks (1993) made by Walker and Pratibha Parmar[11] and with Gloria Steinem, who wrote an introduction to Dorkenoo's 1994 book Cutting the Rose: Female Genital Mutilation.[5]
In 1994, Dorkenoo was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.[5] In 2000, she and Gloria Steinem received Equality Now's international human rights award.[12] In 2012, she was made honorary senior research fellow in the School of Health Sciences at City University London, and in 2013 she was named one of the BBC's 100 Women.[4][13]
Dorkenoo's Cutting the Rose: Female Genital Mutilation (1994) was selected by an international jury in 2002 as one of the "Africa's 100 Best Books of the 20th Century".[4][8][14]
Dorkenoo died of cancer in London at the age of 65 on 18 October 2014,[15] survived by her husband Freddie Green, her sons Kobina and Ebow, and her stepchildren.[9]
