Sharon LaFraniere
Reporter
The New York Times

Citation
In covering southern Africa for The New York Times, Sharon LaFraniere has made the challenges facing the region's women her specialty. She has written about widows forced to have sex with their in-laws as a way of spiritual "cleansing," women who have been incontinent for years because of birthing injuries, even though a $300 operation could repair the damage, and teenage girls who drop out of school because there are no toilets to use when they have their periods. Her reporting provides a window into African culture that is both unflinching and respectful, dispassionate and intimate. As LaFraniere's articles demonstrate, the "fearless pursuit and expression of truth" can manifest itself not only in reporting from a war zone or disaster area, but also in covering the most mundane circumstances of everyday life--the village without a doctor, the school without a toilet, and the widow without a choice.

Excerpt
Excerpt AIDS Now Compels Africa to Challenge Widows' 'Cleansing'
May 11, 2005
MCHINJI, MALAWI--In the hours after James Mbewe was laid to rest three years ago, in an unmarked grave not far from here, his 23-year-old wife, Fanny, neither mourned him nor accepted visits from sympathizers. Instead, she hid in his sister's hut, hoping that the rest of her in-laws would not find her.
But they hunted her down, she said, and insisted that if she refused to exorcise her dead husband's spirit, she would be blamed every time a villager died. So she put her two small children to bed and then forced herself to have sex with James's cousin.
"I cried, remembering my husband," she said. "When he was finished, I went outside and washed myself because I was very afraid. I was so worried I would contract AIDS and die and leave my children to suffer."
Here and in a number of nearby nations including Zambia and Kenya, a husband's funeral has long concluded with a final ritual: sex between the widow and one of her husband's relatives, to break the bond with his spirit and, it is said, save her and the rest of the village from insanity or disease. Widows have long tolerated it, and traditional leaders have endorsed it, as an unchallenged tradition of rural African life.
Now AIDS is changing that. Political and tribal leaders are starting to speak out publicly against so-called sexual cleansing, condemning it as one reason H.I.V. has spread to 25 million sub-Saharan Africans, killing 2.3 million last year alone. They are being prodded by leaders of the region's fledging women's rights movement, who contend that lack of control over their sex lives is a major reason 6 in 10 of those infected in sub-Saharan Africa are women.
But change is coming slowly, village by village, hut by hut. In a region where belief in witchcraft is widespread and many women are taught from childhood not to challenge tribal leaders or the prerogatives of men, the fear of flouting tradition often outweighs even the fear of AIDS.
"It is very difficult to end something that was done for so long," said Monica Nsofu, a nurse and AIDS organizer in the Monze district in southern Zambia, about 200 miles south of the capital, Lusaka. "We learned this when we were born. People ask, Why should we change?"
In Zambia, where one out of five adults is now infected with the virus, the National AIDS Council reported in 2000 that this practice was very common. Since then, President Levy Mwanawasa has declared that forcing new widows into sex or marriage with their husband's relatives should be discouraged, and the nation's tribal chiefs have decided not to enforce either tradition, their spokesman said.

Biography
Sharon LaFraniere has covered southern Africa for The New York Times since 2003. She is based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Before joining the Times, she spent five years as a foreign correspondent for The Washington Post, based in Moscow. At the Post, she also served as an acting deputy national editor, an investigative reporter on the national staff, and a Metro investigative reporter. She began her journalism career as a general assignment reporter for the Louisville Times. Born in Detroit, Michigan, LaFraniere, 50, received a B.A. degree magna cum laude from Brown University and a M.S. degree in journalism from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. She is married to Michael Wines, the Johannesburg bureau chief for The New York Times. They have three children.

Articles
"Another School Barrier for African Girls: No Toilet"

"Forced to Marry Before Puberty, African Girls Pay Lasting Price"

"Nightmare for African Women: Birthing Injury and Little Help"

"Entrenched Epidemic: Wife-Beatings in Africa"

"AIDS Now Compels Africa to Challenge Widows' 'Cleansing'"