Expertise: human rights, media, folklore, culture, literature, research, heritage, writing

Languages: Arabic
Bio: Arwa Othman is a writer, journalist, anthropology researcher, and leading advocate working to end child marriage in Yemen. She was appointed as the first woman as Minister of Culture in 2014 and she served as a diplomat in Yemen’s mission in Tunisia until April 2021. In 2013, Arwa participated in Yemen’s national dialogue conference, tasked with shaping the country’s new constitution. The recommendations by the rights and freedom committee, which Arwa headed, are among the most progressive and rights-respecting to come out of the process. They include reforms that could vastly improve the lives of Yemeni women and children, such as enshrining gender equality in law, prohibiting discrimination, and setting the minimum age for marriage at 18. The committee also recommended criminal sanctions for anyone who forces a child to marry. She is also a researcher in the social department of the Yemen Studies and Research Center, head of the House of Popular Heritage, a member of the Basic Committee for Human Sciences, a storyteller and a researcher in folklore, and a member of the Yemeni Authors and Writers Union.

Arwa is widely credited with bringing these strong recommendations to fruition. After that, she became the first woman appointed as Minister of Culture. Also in 2014, Arwa Arwa was chosen as one of the recipients of the "Alison de Forge" Prize for Exceptional Human Rights Activism, granted by Human Rights Watch, and before that in 2011 she was awarded the Minerva Prize dedicated to the lecturer achievements of women. Arwa, born in Taiz, is admired by many for her activism and her unconditional solidarity with vulnerable groups - she’s a great supporter of minorities’ rights in Yemen, i.e. Jews, Muhamasheen, and Baha’is. Her unwavering courage has also made her a target of aggressive tarnishing campaigns as well as of physical assaults by conservative groups for her outspoken, and sometimes secular, stances against fundamentalism and patriarchy.

 Arwa has always shown powerful critic against religious leaders and corrupt politicians. Arwa is known for her forthright and outspoken writings using her real name, which was not the case when she started off writing columns in the local press - she wrote in disguise between 1982-1984. Since then until today, She published many collections of stories, including "Happening in Tanka the country of mosquitos ", which won first place for the Sharjah Prize for Arab Creativity and also issued for it "Goddalah and the Bootstrap”, three parts of the Yemeni folk tale "Hazawi and Raqat al-Henna" and the question of the woman in the popular narrative. Arwa holds a BA in Philosophy from the Faculty of Arts, Sana'a University, 1989 and a master's degree, in cultural sociology from the College of April 9, Tunis 2021.