Women around the world have marked November 25th as a day against violence against women for more than 30 years, in remembrance of the Mirabal sisters, political activists who were assassinated in the Dominican Republic on November 25, 1960, under orders from dictator Rafael Trujillo. For the past eight years, our correspondent Silvia Parra has worked to put this day on the civic calendar of the city of San Francisco. Parra is known in San Francisco’s Mission District as the artist MamaCoatl. Every year, she and other women artists, dancers, poets and healers seek to transform the culture of violence from a space of art, activism and spirituality. In recent days the group held the seventh festival of “Guardianas de la Vida,” or “Guardians of Life,” a night of music, poetry and dance, in which the artists asked the question of why in 2013 there is still violence against women. Silvia Parra has this story from the event.

(Complete story available in Spanish.)