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Does Educating Girls Really Change the World?

Girl Rising: One Girl with Courage is a Revolution. Directed by Richard E. Robbins, RO*CO Films Educational, 2013. 101 min. $350.00 (University price). www.rocoeducational.com

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Abstract

Directed by Richard Robbins and released in 2013, Girl Rising is a documentary-style film that takesviewers on a journey to nine countries, introducing a local girl in each context whose story underscores themyriad challenges facing girls in developing countries around the world. Interspersed between the girls’stories are statistics that offer viewers a macro-level picture of girls’ status in places like Haiti, Ethiopia, India,and Peru. The upshot of the film is that increasing girls’ access to education has the potential to spark broadbasedeconomic, political, and social change in the developing world. Among the film’s strengths are itseffectiveness as a consciousness-raising tool, beautiful composition, and the careful balance it strikesbetween depicting girls’ plight and foregrounding their strength and resilience in the face of hardship. Nevertheless, the film’s narrow focus on schooling for girls not only oversimplifies the multiple and intersectingforces – local, national, and global - that shape and constrain their lives, but also oversells education as asilver bullet solution.

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Correspondence to Gail E Wolfe.

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Wolfe, G.E. Does Educating Girls Really Change the World?. Sex Roles 71, 278–281 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-014-0403-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-014-0403-7

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