Photo: AFP.
Students attend a class at Afghanistan‘s Radio Begum in 2021. The founder wanted to get the station set up in hopes that the coming Taliban takeover would spare it.
What does it take for women’s voices to be heard? It depends a lot on the local culture but even more on the determination of individual women working together.
Gabe Bullard writes at Nieman Reports, “On March 8, 2021, a new radio station launched in Kabul: Radio Begum, run by women, for women. The timing was deliberate — the station opened on International Women’s Day, and just as the United States military was withdrawing from Afghanistan.
“ ‘I decided to launch this radio station in order to be ready for the day the Taliban takes power,’ said Hamida Aman, the station’s founder. ‘We knew that as soon as they take power, it will be segregation, and again, it will be against women.’
“Five months later, the Taliban retook Kabul and imposed new laws restricting women’s access to schools and their movements in public. Five years later, Radio Begum is still on the air. The station follows the letter of the law, even as restrictions tighten. It doesn’t cover politics or any subjects that are off-limits to public discussion among women under Taliban edicts. Instead, it focuses on health, religion, and providing educational programs to replace the schooling women are now prohibited from receiving.
“ ‘They banned schools, but not education,’ Aman said.
“Begum may be unique in Afghanistan, but its model is in practice around the world. It is one of many women-run radio stations — from rural India to the Peruvian Amazon — that, although not part of a formal network, share many attributes and goals.
“Some of these stations, like Begum, are oases of information in areas where women are restricted in what they can access. Others, in countries where the government is less restrictive, provide an antidote to male-dominated media that ignore issues that affect women. And still other stations challenge cultural barriers and break the silence around topics that are rarely if ever discussed. …
“ ‘There is no more public space for women, and it’s kind of a public space,’ Aman said of her station.
Women have been working to create these kinds of spaces on-air since the earliest years of radio. … ‘Radio bridged, connected, and blurred the boundaries between the private and public spheres and by doing so, spoke to women as housewives, workers, consumers and citizens,’ says a UNESCO report on radio’s position in the world.
“Modern women-run radio stations have seized on this potential to blur boundaries and adapted it to changing times and to specific locations and audience needs.
“ ‘If given the opportunity, radio becomes a really important agent of change for women, in particular, especially in cultures where to speak out and to be open and to have an opinion, to have a say, can kill you,’ said Monica De La Torre, a media professor at Arizona State University and author of the book Feminista Frequencies. …
“Even as advancing technology has led to new independent media outlets and expanded ways of sharing and accessing information, radio remains a powerful medium for breaking barriers, broaching taboo subjects, and speaking directly to oppressed or obscured groups in society. The nonprofit that runs Begum, for example, also operates a TV station that broadcasts via satellite from France (where Aman is now based), and it has a smartphone platform as well. Because it’s not within Afghanistan’s borders, the television channel can be more open in its programming, but for Aman, radio will always have a place. ‘It’s cheap and everybody can have access,’ she said.
“Radio remains accessible and portable, even without an internet connection, electricity, or the ability to read. The fact that broadcasts generally come from a local tower gives radio a geographic connection that isn’t inherent to most other media. And through call-in programs, broadcasts aren’t limited to one-way conversations.
“For Begum, this means women can — within the parameters of government restrictions — ask questions they may not be able to ask elsewhere, as the station’s programs center around life issues, and are interactive, Aman said. Listeners ‘can call us at any time, to talk with our doctors, to talk with our psychologists, to talk with our spiritual counselor to get information about religion,’ she added.
“Even when women don’t have specific questions, there’s value in hearing other women’s voices on these programs, according to Saba Chaman, who was the first director of Radio Begum and has worked for Begum TV since 2024. ‘It provides them with an opportunity to listen to other women, to listen to the way they talk, to listen to the way they start and finish their sentences,’ Chaman said.
“Operations haven’t been entirely smooth for Begum, however. In February 2025, Taliban officials alleging violations of the law raided the station, arrested two employees, confiscated hard drives, phones, and documents, and shut down the broadcast. The station was back on the air in a few weeks, and the employees were released in a few months.
“ ‘It hurt us a lot. It was really a painful year for us,’ Aman said. ‘But despite all these challenges, we continue our activities.’
“Radio also offers another key benefit to its audience: anonymity. Listeners can tune in privately and there’s no record of their activity once they switch off the receiver. Nobody knows who is listening, who is speaking on-air, or who is calling in. The ability to anonymously call a station comes up often in conversations about women’s radio, usually with a similar narrative.
“Station managers have stories of women who call in to share experiences they can’t talk about with the people around them. Other women hearing the stories then realize they’ve had similar experiences. They call, too, and the process repeats, with more women calling in anonymously.
“ ‘You could call in and maybe disguise your voice a little bit, or maybe share something so intimate and personal because of the medium,’ said De La Torre, the Arizona State University media professor. Because a station is local, a caller knows they will be heard by their community when they dial in to share a story. A listener knows they’re hearing their neighbor’s voice. Each broadcast chips away at a culture of silence.”
More at Nieman Reports, here.
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