Khede Kasra
Issue 13 | December 2009
Agency
Leo Burnett, Beirut
Creative Team
Executive Creative Director: Bechara Mouzannar, Creative Director: Chermine Assadian, Copywriter: Rana Jajjar, Rana Khoury, Art Directors: Tania Saleh, Nayla Baaklini, Reem Kotob, Yasmina Baz
Other Credits
Deputy Managing Director: Nada Abi Saleh, Account Executive: Dima Kfoury
Date
2009
Background
The Hariri Foundation asked Leo Burnett Beirut to help them raise awareness about the inequalities and disadvantages experienced by many women in Lebanon in the hope it would lead to cultural reform.
For instance, Lebanese women cannot give their nationality to their children if married to a foreigner and, in any contested divorce, they lose custody automatically of their children if they are aged 9 or more.
In addition, violence against women is commonplace.
Idea
In both the spoken and the written word, most sentences in Arabic are constructed using a male vocative. In other words, it is assumed that the listener or reader is male. This can be changed to a female vocative simply by adding an accent line or ‘kasra’ below the words.
The idea was to invite Lebanese women to ‘make their mark’ literally by adding the ‘kasra’ accent on strategically placed posters in public places.
Prominent Lebanese TV personalities were mailed before International Women’s Day on March 8th 2009 and asked to wear the ‘kasra’ badge and to talk about the issues, which many of them did on current affairs and entertainment programmes.
During the day the Minister of Education distributed ‘kasra’ stickers and urged all Lebanese women to get involved.
The core message was that you can make big changes happen through small actions.
Results
The campaign sparked debate in all the news media, generating PR to a value of $1.8m. In addition, the campaign slogan of ‘Getting things moving’ began to appear in everyday conversations.
This is the first, important step on a long road to social change in Lebanon. Not just every woman in the country but now every man knows that women’s rights are an issue they all need to address and debate.
Our Thoughts
This campaign won Gold at the Golden Drum awards in October and while we normally try to get work hot of the press, as it were, we were delighted when creative director Bechara Mouzannar got in touch.
The subtlety of the pun is completely lost in translation, but the campaign line, ‘Take the kasra and place it beneath the word’ also reads as ‘Let’s get things moving’.
It is because the idea of ‘Make your Mark’ is so simple that it can empowering. Let’s hope so.