Centreville — Even though Centreville resident Angela Peabody moved to the U.S. from Liberia more than 30 years ago, her heart is still with the people of her birthright country.
Peabody and her sons started the Global Woman PEACE Foundation in 2010 to empower and provide education to young women all over the world, namely for women facing gender-based violence. Earlier this year, Peabody released her novel, “When the Games Froze,” to benefit her non-profit organization.
“When the Games Froze” is a story following a young woman’s journey from Ghana to an American university, where she copes with a past plagued by genital mutilation, an issue Peabody has always wanted to confront with her non-profit organization. The book hit Amazon.com in early January. All sales will benefit Global Woman, which is in the process of building its first school in Liberia, complete with a girl’s dormitory.
“Education is the key to everything,” Peabody said. “The only way to empower these girls is through education, even if it means teaching them a trade like hair design, sewing, designing, or gardening. They need something that will give them a career so they will not feel that the only way they can survive is through sex-trafficking.”
A COUP D’ÉTAT in Liberia drove Peabody, her husband and two sons out of Liberia in 1980, when rebel forces overthrew the previously established republic.
“There was a bloody coup d’état in 1980, and both my father and father-in-law were government officials when they were alive,” Peabody said. “They both had already passed away by 1980; however, [the rebels] were targeting family surnames, so my family was at risk on both ends.”
The inspiration for Global Woman came when Peabody and her sons made the journey back to Liberia to bury her late husband. Both Peabody and her sons saw firsthand how war can destroy morality and how poverty specifically impacts women.
“We saw the ruins of the war, and the devastation to the infrastructure of the country,” Peabody said. “There were so many girls that were out there on the streets. They were either marketing their bodies, not in school, and if they were in school, their only means to do so was to sell their bodies to men two to three times their ages. We saw what was going on in the country and we decided we wanted to do something about it.”
Peabody’s eldest son, Arnold DeShield, treasurer and co-founder of Global Woman, was 11 years old when the family to left Africa. He said his first trip back to Liberia in 2002 left him reeling and wanting to help the people in the aftermath of the civil war.
“That trip alone was an eye opener for me,” DeShield said. “It was the tail end of the war. I saw what the country had come to. At that time, the way people lived is part of what we stand against, which is the exploitation of young people, and anything involving the sex trade.”
He said his mother’s first book, which was based on the family’s experience in Liberia and moving to the U.S., began their involvement with global women’s issues. It was published in 2005, and led the family to publish a magazine addressing certain issues.
“HER WRITING the book was therapy for all of us,” DeShield said. “It opened up the door and, from that point on, she wanted to do more and we started a magazine, launching Global Women Magazine. We needed to have a foundation since we were already being approached as one. We were looking to shed light on gender-based violence, and female genital mutilation falls under that.”
Global Woman officially became a 501(C)(3) non-profit organization in March of 2012. Peabody has since teamed up with two other likeminded non-profits, Hope 2 Liberia and Change Area Network, to construct a school in Marshall City, Liberia. The school, designed to be grade school through high school, is still in its planning stages.
While the school has yet to break ground, Peabody said she has already started thinking about a post-graduate option for their future students.
“We are collaborating in building this school in Liberia, and after we are done with that we are going to take them one step further,” Peabody said. “We started asking ourselves, ‘what happens after?’ After we complete the school in Marshall, we will start building a university so these girls have a place to go for higher education.”
“When the Games Froze” furthers two of Peabody’s goals: to benefit Global Woman as well as raise awareness of genital mutilation. While Peabody herself was never a victim of the practice, she said she knew many girls in Liberia who did suffer.
“I am a writer, a journalist by profession,” Peabody said. “If I had to stop writing my mind would cease to function. I decided to write the book because I wanted to write about a topic that is much unknown in the U.S.”
She said this is her second book, but her first on a topic she has always wanted to address.
“As we speak now, 8,000 little girls around the world are being mutilated somewhere in some village,” she said. “I decided to write about it and use the book as a tool to educate women as well as men about female genital mutation.”
She said the timing of the book, with a plot also involving American football and Christianity, coincided perfectly with the planning of the school.
“All the proceeds will go to the non-profit,” Peabody said. “As I wrote it, I realized that we are going to build this school. We started the foundation and I decided, since all the money from the book is going to be related to the organization, we should use it to build the school and furnish it so the girls have some place to go.”
PEABODY SAID she has high hopes for both her book, Global Woman and the school the foundation is planning.
“It is my wish that that the book will be circulated all over, not only in the U.S., but also all over the world,” Peabody said. “The main goal is to get it circulated enough and to raise awareness so that enough people will know what female genital mutilation is. I would like to see it become a household term, so boys will know about it and will not allow anyone to do that to their little girls.”
She won’t really be satisfied until she sees her school up and running, ideally by 2016. “The day I see the kids pile into the classrooms and the girls go into the dormitories and teach them to be ladies, I will feel like I have accomplished something great,” Peabody said.
DeShield said the school in Liberia will be the first of many schools and safe places for victims of gender-based violence. In addition to building refuges, Global Women will also continue spreading awareness of female genital mutilation.
“It’s not just Liberia,” DeShield said. “Female genital mutilation does not just affect Liberia. It is throughout Africa and so many difference parts of the world. What we want to do is bring awareness to the practice of female genital mutilation. There is a big push going on in Europe and we want to bring that to the United States’ attention. The whole world needs to know what is going on. Egypt has outlawed the practice, and other countries need to get on board. The practice is based on old ideals that should be changed over time. We want to be able to provide a safe haven for those who want to reverse or change it.”
“When the Games Froze” is published by Xulon Press, a Christian publishing company. In the coming weeks, the book will appear on the shelves of Barnes and Noble stores as well as online.
Peabody will be signing copies of “When the Games Froze” at Gospel Spreading Bible Bookstore in Washington D.C. on March 15, 11 a.m. – 3 p.m.
It is now available to order on her website, www.globalwomanpeacefoundation.org,as well as on Xulon Press’ official website, www.xulonpress.com/bookstore.