RUNNING HEAD: A Powerful Noise Reflective Essay Mahan 1

A Reflection on “A Powerful Noise”

Rachael Mahan

Texas Woman’s University

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The film, A Powerful Noise shows a lot about what women all across the world go

through on a daily basis. The movie focused specifically on HIV, lack of education, and poverty

in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Mali, and Vietnam. This film taught me a lot even though it wasn’t in

English and the things that these women are fighting for are super important and need more

attention if they are going to be solved in the next few years.

In this video I learned that HIV is commonly spread through men injecting drugs in

Vietnam then spreading it to their wives through sex. Sometimes the women won’t know that

their husbands are even injecting drugs much less that they have contracted HIV. The women

will often transmit the infection to their children during pregnancy, labor and delivery, or

breastfeeding, sometimes even before they know they have it themselves. The way that this

impacts women worldwide is that the HIV epidemic is still huge, and this is not just a problem in

Vietnam. Although the film focused in Vietnam, HIV is still prominent all over the world. I

learned that there is an extreme lack of education in Mali that affects predominately women. This

makes it very common for women to be domestic servants just to survive. They often don’t have

the money to go back to school and they struggle to make ends meet to have a family. Finally, I

saw the economic hardship that has occurred in Bosnia-Herzegovina since the war. There are

severe ethnic disparities and women are fighting and working together to bring the countries

together to rebuild. It helped teach me how powerful women are through how much they have

achieved over the past few years. This impacts women all over the world because it can show us

to come together and reminds us that no matter what our ethnicities, we all face similar struggles

as women and can make major progress in women’s rights all across the world by working

together.
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The main social factor that impacted HIV was the stigma; so many people are ashamed

and scared to get tested because the community has stigmatized HIV and people can be judged

and are sometimes even fired from their jobs due to HIV positive tests. When it comes to lack of

education, the economics is the main factor, it costs money to send children to school and many

families don’t have the money and they need the children to work from a young age to help

provide for the family. When the child doesn’t get a proper education, they often become

domestic servants and then cannot afford to send their own children to school. Finally, the

economic hardship of women is affected by cultural norms- for example, women are often

expected to take care of the children, so it can be hard for them to take care of young children

and go out and work at the same time, so they often suffer more economic hardships than men

due to these cultural norms.

HIV can affect both physical and mental well being of a woman and her health. If HIV is

not treated properly and promptly, it can become AIDS and even lead to death. Due to the stigma

discussed in the previous paragraph, they often avoid testing and/or treatment until the last

minute and it is often too late. The stigma itself can affect their emotional health due to being

ostracized from the community, but also from the possible loss of husbands and children from

the disease and the grief that comes with it. The lack of education and economic hardship go

hand in hand and can affect mental wellbeing because of the depression of not getting to learn

and not being able to read and write for themselves. They can struggle with money and providing

for their children which can hurt them both physically in the inability to take care of their health

but also in the worry for their children that they can’t afford to do things for them.

I most admired the efforts to overcome the challenge of HIV in this film because it kills

so many people every year- especially women and children. I also admired this effort because it
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helps to reduce the stigma so that people are more willing and able to get help and get tested to

prevent the spread of the disease.

This will help me in the future to be more willing to fight for myself and others. Seeing

the power and strength that these women bring to the table just reminds me of the strength I have

inside. This movie will change how I see things in the future and how I will do things. I will

change the way I look at the world and how I try to help other people.
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References

Ventures, G. (2012, June 06). A Powerful Noise. Retrieved December 2, 2018, from

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEtXEdr50dE