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seeing culture as an obstacle to women’s human rights to ensuring women’s
equal cultural rights.
B.
Recommendations
79. The Special Rapporteur recommends that States review the following
issues so as to assess the level of implementation, or non-implementation, of the
cultural rights of women in their territories on a basis of equality. States should
adopt adequate measures in response, taking into consideration their three-fold
obligations to respect, protect and fulfil the cultural rights of women, on the
basis of equality with men:
(a) Restrictions on women wishing to undertake any form of art and
self-expression, to enter cultural heritage sites or premises, to participate in
cultural events or ceremonies and to engage in interpreting and applying
particular texts, rituals or customs. This includes identifying cultural and
religious practices, customs and traditions that prohibit such engagement by
women;
(b) Ensuring women’s mobility, in particular to attend or participate in
cultural activities, and steps taken to facilitate their attendance/participation;
(c) The ability of women to access their own cultural heritage as well as
that of others through, in particular, their right to information and their access
to the Internet;
(d) The existence of rules or customs prescribing different educational
content or levels for girls and boys;
(e) Measures adopted to ensure that women participate, on an equal
basis with men, in identifying and selecting what constitutes cultural heritage,
in assigning meaning to such heritage and in the decisions relating to what
should be transmitted to future generations;
(f) The ability of women to engage freely with people, ideas and events
beyond their own family and community, to be part of one or more cultural
communities of their choice and to join and leave these communities, including
religious communities, at will;
(g) The ability of women to participate in decision-making within their
own communities and to contribute to cultural life, through the exercise of their
freedoms of expression, association and thought, and their right to education;
(h) The freedom of women to refuse to participate in traditions, customs
and practices that infringe upon human dignity and rights, to critique existing
cultural norms and traditional practices and to create new cultural meanings
and norms of behaviour;
(i) The existence of formal or informal dress codes for women and men
and the consequences for contravening these on girls and women as compared
to men;
(j) The resources, including financial support, given to women in
comparison to men in the fields of art, sport and science. For example, States
are encouraged to assess sports facilities in schools and communities to which
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