Youth & Family Services will host its 33rd Annual Luncheon on Wednesday, March 27, 2013 at the Stockton Civic Auditorium. Women's Center-YFS is proud to welcome renowned political leader, women's rights advocate and author Ayaan Hirsi Ali to serve as the keynote speaker for this year’s luncheon.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali was born in Mogadishu, Somalia in 1969. As a young child, she was subjected to female genital mutilation. In 1992, Ayaan was married off by her father to a distant cousin who lived in Canada. In order to escape this marriage, she fled to the Netherlands where she was given asylum, and in time citizenship. In her early years in Holland she worked in factories and as a maid. She quickly learned Dutch, however, and was able to study at the University of Leiden. Working as a translator for Somali immigrants, she saw at first hand the inconsistencies between liberal, Western society and tribal, Muslim cultures.
After earning her M.A. in political science, Ayaan worked as a researcher for the Wiardi Beckman Foundation in Amsterdam. She then served as an elected member of the Dutch parliament from 2003 to 2006. While in parliament, she focused on furthering the integration of non-Western immigrants into Dutch society, and on defending the rights of Muslim women. She campaigned to raise awareness of violence against women, including honor killings and female genital mutilation, practices that had followed the immigrants into Holland.
In 2004, Ayaan gained international attention following the murder of Theo van Gogh. Van Gogh had directed her short film Submission, a film about the oppression of women under Islam. The assassin, a radical Muslim, left a death threat for her pinned to Van Gogh's chest.
Ayaan has been honored as one of TIME Magazine's "100 Most Influential People," a Glamour Magazine Hero and as Reader's Digest's European of the Year. She established the AHA Foundation in 2007 to help protect and defend the rights of women. Ayaan has published a collection of essays, The Caged Virgin (2006), a best-selling memoir, Infidel (2007), the second volume of her autobiography, Nomad (2011), and has written and delivered many speeches and articles.
She is currently a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., researching the relationship between the West and Islam. A luminous example of enlightenment and courage, passion and persistence, Ayaan is an emblem of hope to men and women around the globe, proving that an undaunted spirit cannot be vanquished.
The Women's Center-YFS’ luncheon has become a premier event in our community; each year more than 700 guests attend this event. The goals of the luncheon are to raise awareness in the community about domestic violence, sexual assault and youth homelessness; bring together community leaders to get involved in these causes; raise funds to support the Women's Center-YFS’ services; honor victims and celebrate survivors; and inspire people to take action to end violence and youth homelessness in their community. All proceeds are used to support the agency's free, confidential services and shelters for victims of domestic violence, sexual assault and homeless and runaway youth in San Joaquin County.
Doors to the Civic Auditorium will open at 11:00 a.m. and the program will start promptly at 11:30 a.m. Individual lunches are available for $40.00 (vegetarian lunch available upon request) and reserved tables are available for $350. Sponsorship opportunities ranging from $500 to $5,000 are also available.
For more information, or to reserve your seats for the luncheon, contact Kate Macek, Marketing & Development Director, at [email protected] or Tiffany Baca, Development Associate, at [email protected], or call (209) 941-2611. More information is also available at www.womenscenteryfs.org.
Save the Date!
March 27, 2013
Stockton Civic Auditorium