TEAM SHIRZANAN – GLOBAL AWARENESS CAMPAIGN – July 16 – 25, 2015

SHIRZANAN is the Persian word for female heroes and describes the team leading a global awareness campaign promoting female sports participation as a fundamental right and means to gender equality and greater independence.

TEAM SHIRZANAN features 9 Muslim female athletes from Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt, Jordan, Iran and the USA joining forces with a group of Iowans on the seven-day, 462-mile RAGBRAI bicycle ride across Iowa including:

– Pakistani Olympic swimmer Kiran Khan
– Saudi Arabian mountain climber Raha Moharrak
– Afghani football player Hajar Abulfazl
– Egyptian cyclist Rehab Shawky
– Jordanian cyclist Amani Ammoura
– Iranian snowboarder / surfer Mona Seraji – American basketball player
– American Olympic weightlifter Kulsoom Abdullah
– American Traditional karate champion Soolmaz Abooali

Our mission will be carried out through a robust social media initiative disseminating information and images of our Muslim team members’ previous successes and Team Shirzanan’s real-time efforts. Our hashtags are #RideForRights and #TeamShirzanan.

We aim to empower all females facing gender discrimination and stereotypes to pursue the benefits of sport – including health, academic, economic, social and political equity. Sport is the unifying theme for this unprecedented multi-national gathering of Muslim athletes. By shining a light on these women, we present a counter-narrative to stereotypes exacerbated by Western media.

SHIRZANAN, the news and advocacy platform whose work TEAM SHIRZANAN supports, is a nonprofit project still in development – endeavoring to empower Muslim female athletes by increasing and improving their media visibility and representation. We use the topic of sport to catalyze discussion and improvements in Muslim women’s rights.

SHIRZANAN is a project of Non-Stop Media – a public charity dedicated to the freedoms of expression and media – and whose mission is to produce and distribute uncensored information, particularly to populations whose governments limit its availability.

Thank you for your participation and commitment to supporting our mission and spreading our message in social media and mainstream media.

A memorable, magical experience awaits us all…

Yours truly, Mara Gubuan.

www.Non-StopMedia.org
www.ShirzananGlobal.net
Facebook.com/ShirzananGlobal
Instagram and Twitter @ShirzananGlobal