Artist: Isa Rosenberger (Wien)
Presented work: „Jede hat das Recht auf
Arbeit ...“ (2007)
In collaboration with Snježana Čalija, Immaculée Mukankuranga,
Yanjindulam Densmaa, Paula Rios, Rafia Bigzadeh, Amita Lugger, Gülay Aslan
and Melek Eş (photograph taken on the central plaza of the UNO City Vienna)
Texts by eight women from Vienna [DE]
[EN] [TR]
[HR] [SI]
[HU] [CZ]
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Article 23
1. Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.
2. Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.
3. Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
4. Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.
Snježana Čalija: Our education and professional experience are only very rarely acknowledged. Migrants can be found in the worst-paid and most work-intensive segments of the employment market. Our living conditions are for the most part worse than those of native Austrian women. I think legal and social structures are responsible for this.
Immaculée Mukankuranga: Although I am an African woman my blood is just as red as anybody else’s on this planet. I’m saying this because I’ve made rather different experiences here in Austria. Despite the fact that I hold a high school diploma and that I’m going to finish my studies of nutritional science in Vienna people often treat me as if I were illiterate! My diploma was not acknowledged and the employment market’s only offer was a job as a cleaning lady – and I needed steady nerves for this job!
Yanjindulam Densmaa: To learn a language does not only mean to learn to speak it but also to learn to ‘write’ it. This implies continuing education. Education is fundamental if you want to enter the job market – and this is your ticket into society.
Paula Rios: As a second-generation refugee child from Chile I grew up in Vienna and in 1987, when I was fourteen, I moved to Spain with my father, a journalist (double migration). Since then I’ve carried the hope for a better world and the sadness of being stateless, or rather, without a home inside my heart. I’ve learnt how to live between the cultures – in order to feel at home in all cultures. Being stigmatized as a woman coming from (e.g.) Latin America makes integration in Austria difficult – yet sometimes it makes it easier – but it makes it almost impossible to obtain unbiased self-fulfillment.
Rafia Bigzadeh: I come from Afghanistan and I earned a degree in art in Turkey. Sixteen years ago I came to Austria as a refugee. When my kids where still small I had to take on any job. Among other things I was working in a kitchen for three years. Over the past sixteen years I’ve had to surmount many difficulties and I have gathered a lot of experience when doing voluntary work. I’m dreaming of sharing my experience either in the social sector or as an artist but this seems to be impossible, which really frustrates me.
Amita Lugger: Life hasn’t been easy for me in Austria. The music diploma I had obtained at an Indian university was not acknowledged in Austria. As I had attended a course in office management for travel agencies in India I got at least a job in a travel agency in Austria but, in accordance with my qualifications, I would much rather work as a music teacher
Gülay Aslan: Housewives aren’t acknowledged in our society. Mothers, above all, who have to do a lot of work in the household, are not appreciated. If women who only take care of the household do not get any direct financial support, they have only minimal rights vis-à-vis their husbands.
Melek Eş: 1. For a visa you have to prove an income.
2. If you want a job, you have to show your visa.
3. In order to qualify for an apartment you have to declare a certain salary.
4. To get work in a company, even in a cleaning company, flawless command of German in speaking and writing is required.
5. If an immigrant has come through this entire process, then there is eventually time for integration and assimilation.
6. In order to overcome all these obstacles you need access to the employment market!