DOMAINS OF DELIGHT
SAFER SPACES
Safer spaces are those that enable deep, collective learning and conversation about sexual well-being and gender (in)equity..
A community organization or service provider creates opportunities for expansive conversations around gender health, rights, equity, sex and sexuality. Spaces are facilitated by well-trained facilitators with training in SRHR, sex and gender rights and equity.
“WE HAVE THE FREEDOM TO TALK HERE. I, FOR EXAMPLE, DON’T LIKE TO TALK MUCH ABOUT MY PERSONAL LIFE. BUT … YOU END UP OPENING UP, YOU END UP, LIKE, VENTING. AND YOU GET SELF-HELP THERE WHEN YOU’RE TALKING.”
(Flor, Brazil)
DOMAINS OF DELIGHT
01
SAFE SPACES
Safe spaces are those that enable deep, collective learning and conversation about sexual well-being and gender (in)equity..
A community organization or service provider creates opportunities for expansive conversations around gender health, rights, equity, sex and sexuality. Spaces are facilitated by well-trained facilitators with training in SRHR, sex and gender rights and equity.
“WE HAVE THE FREEDOM TO TALK HERE. I, FOR EXAMPLE, DON’T LIKE TO TALK MUCH ABOUT MY PERSONAL LIFE. BUT … YOU END UP OPENING UP, YOU END UP, LIKE, VENTING. AND YOU GET SELF-HELP THERE WHEN YOU’RE TALKING.”
(Flor, Brazil)
INTRODUCTION ▸
Safer Spaces
Safer spaces are places where people can go to feel safe and supported and talk about topics that are often taboo, including sexual well-being and gender. By being in safe spaces and taking part in conversations, individuals can become more knowledgeable about the body, pleasure, sex, sexual health, rights, relationships and power. They also experience freedom to be themselves and to talk and learn without feeling judged or shamed.
Safer spaces are places where people can go to feel safe and supported and talk about topics that are often taboo, including sexual well-being and gender. By being in safer spaces and taking part in conversations, individuals can become more knowledgeable about the body, pleasure, sex, sexual health, rights, relationships and power. They also experience freedom to be themselves and to talk and learn without feeling judged or shamed.
“I recognize the importance of seeking support from others. Since meeting these wonderful people, I can see myself…constantly living within the tree because I can both be taken care of and take care of myself. I have people I can trust, confide in …”
– Mesi, Tanzania
Safer spaces sometimes converge with Services that make you smile: inclusive, welcoming places where people can access high-quality SRHR services can also be safe spaces for learning and conversation.
One group of young mothers in Tanzania, for example, described the life-changing impact of being able to access safer spaces for learning and conversation, which helped them develop the knowledge and confidence they needed to seek out and access the SRHR services that were available in their communities.
WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE IN PRACTICE?
What it looks like in practice?
Our research among women in Brazil and young adults in Tanzania shows that when an organization creates safe and supported spaces for collaborative learning and conversation, participants are able to engage in conversations and shared learning about topics that they have previously experienced as taboo. Through taking part in this shared learning, participants feel more knowledgeable but also more free to talk and learn about themselves.
“Society, families, they raised their daughters with everything forbidden. It’s this upbringing that comes from the past. You can’t hear, you can’t speak, you can’t see… so the issue of sex is … taboo. It wasn’t talked about, nothing was passed on. Many times the girl even menstruated, like my mother’s case, who menstruated without knowing what would happen to her body. So Ana, [Autoestima] she makes us acquire more knowledge, and understand[ing], and the freedom to talk.”
– Jasmin, Tanzania
It is well established in the research literature that “cultural resources” are crucial for individuals and groups to be able to recognize existing social norms and to imagine alternatives. Research shows that places like this help people understand their own social experiences and are important for learning to recognize social norms and finding alternatives.
In our research, we saw that participating in safer spaces for shared learning enabled participants to access the “cultural resources” and shared understandings needed for recognizing social norms and understanding how they impact their well-being and happiness. The spaces also gave them the confidence and ability to try out new, alternative experiences and ways of being. We conceptualize this as a change in participants’ consciousness and capabilities, drawing on Paulo Freire’s vision of conscientização, which imagines a two-step process of 1) reflection – enabling people to understand the power relations around them and 2) taking action to transform those relations.
In Safer spaces:
a community organization or service provider creates opportunities for expansive conversations around gender, health, rights, equity, sex and sexuality.
Spaces can be online or in person. They can be churches, community halls, homes, hairdressers, festivals or schools.
Conversation-starters can include: “What do you want to learn about gender/sexual health/rights/equity/sexuality?” “Is there a myth about these topics that you once believed, but now know isn’t true?”
Also see the Pleasure Principle ‘Talk Sexy’ for ideas about how to start conversations around these topics, wherever you are.
A good example of a safer space, organized by SisterLove in the U.S., is The Healthy Love Workshop. It offers a hands-on, culturally sensitive, community-based approach to sexual health and pleasure education. Its components—including the Healthy Love Party, Healthy Love Pregame, and Facilitator Training Program—create safe and supportive spaces where participants can engage in real conversations about HIV/STI prevention, sexual pleasure, and well-being, fostering both knowledge and confidence to make positive choices.
In Safer spaces, organizations also adopt a consciousness-raising approach. This approach supports individuals and groups to identify gender, sexual and relationship norms and inequities at play in their lives and communities and imagine positive alternatives for themselves. This might involve doing activities where participants are asked to reflect on topics, for example, “Complete this sentence: “A young man who has a condom in his pocket is…” and “A young woman who has a condom in her pocket is…”, and then compare the answers.
Spaces are facilitated or staffed by well-trained practitioners, with training in SRHR, sex and gender rights and equity.
Facilitators may share resources and information related to sexual well-being and gender rights and equity.
Participants are free and safe to discuss their sexuality and how they would like to experience and express it.
Take a deep dive into Ana Autoestima
DELIGHT DIAGNOSTIC: ASSESS YOUR PROJECT OR ORGANIZATION
We invite you to reflect on how your organization, project, or programme relates to the four levels of action that can help facilitate safer spaces:
Increasing individual awareness and capabilities related to the existence and accessibility of safe spaces;
Advocating for and strengthening policies and legal frameworks that help create and facilitate access to safe spaces;
Addressing social and cultural norms that influence the creation and accessibility of safe spaces;
Ensuring that resources—such as education, health services, housing, access to credit, and experiential support like having a voice, safety, and resilience—are available and accessible to enhance the creation and accessibility of safe spaces.
These areas are facilitators rather than necessary components — safe spaces can still be created and accessed even in challenging contexts.
You can think of these areas as waves that strengthen each other and help create more supportive environments for safe spaces.
Below are some prompts you can use to reflect on your work, how it supports the four levels of action, and how safe spaces shows up in your mission, work, or outcomes—like ripples spreading through different areas.
Consider:
- What spaces for collective learning and conversation are available in your setting/ area/service?
- How do you know if these spaces feel safe and supportive for participants?
- How do you know if these spaces can make waves towards greater gender equity and sexual well-being?
Review:
- Are resources available and/or used to create safe spaces or facilitate access to them?
- Review what feedback data is already collected on a service/programme. Is there any data on whether service users feel safe, included, affirmed and/or listened to?
- Have any consultations been conducted locally that explore what people want from local services? Is there any data on how people want to be included, supported, listened to?
- Are there existing advocacy efforts or collaborations aimed at influencing policies, budgets, or institutional priorities to better support safe spaces?
ACTIVITIES
Activity: Expressing and sharing feelings about gender, bodies and body image
The activity is adapted from AGENDA: A young people’s guide to making positive relationships matter.
This activity helps participants to express and analyse their feelings about gender, bodies and body image, and how this might affect their experiences of pleasure with their bodies.
Time: 1 hour
Materials:
- Flipcharts / notepaper / drawing paper
- Marker pens and other creative / coloured materials
Step 1: Explain the activity
Divide participants into small groups of 4-6. Within the small groups, ask them to discuss and list the ways that society pressures people to look or move a certain way depending on a person’s assumed gender, for example in sports, school, work, at the park; online, etc. They could pick one activity and one gender and focus on that.
Now ask each group to pass their list to the next group thus ensuring that each group ends up with a list from another group.
Based on the list in front of them, ask each group to either use the materials you have provided and create a body sculpture expressing the feelings that the list of social pressures make them feel OR ask them to design a ‘freeze frame’ or photograph expressing the feelings using their own bodies. This means that they discuss and design an image using their own bodies as statues depicting the feelings.
Step 2: Sharing and discussion
Once each group is ready, ask them to share their drawing or ‘freeze frame’ in plenary and ask the other participants to guess what feelings are being expressed. After a brief discussion, ask the presenting group to explain.
Once all groups are done, discuss the key aspects of gendered expectations on our bodies and ask:
Activity: Imagine it
This activity allows participants to provide creative feedback on the space(s) they are accessing through this programme and how they feel about these space(s). Alternatively, it can provide an opportunity to learn from participants what a safer space might feel like, in order to inform programme design.
Time: 1 hour
Materials:
- A series of images printed out or drawn on to smaller pieces of paper or card – these images can express a variety of emotions or sensations; you could simply do an online search and print or be creative and draw your own images; remember to include some abstract images that do not immediately connect to the themes of gender equity and sexual well-being, such as a wall, a shark, roots or a unicorn
- Blank paper / cards
- Marker pens or other coloured pens or pencils
- Flipchart
Step 1: Choosing an image
Spread the images out on a table or the floor so that everyone can see all the images at once. Ask participants: Which image captures your experiences / feelings of taking part in the programme (or visiting the space, etc.)? [Or if using the exercise to gain input for programme design: Which image best reflects what you would like to experience / feel from a safer space?] Let them take a few minutes to select and reflect.
In case a participant doesn’t connect with any of the images, provide a blank paper/card and pens for them to draw their own.
Step 2: Sharing
Ask participants to either write or share verbally why they chose that image. Ask how they felt in the group space if this doesn’t emerge from conversation.
Take notes of key aspects of their sharing on a flipchart.
Step 3: Analysis and summarising
Review the key themes that have emerged from the sharing and summarise for the participants what constitutes a safer space for them, what helps them feel safer and why, and – if not already discussed – ask how we could all collectively create some of these spaces.
INDICATOR OF SUCCESS
Input indicators
Number of staff trained to facilitate safe spaces of shared learning and conversation around sensitive and taboo topics.
Number of facilitated group spaces provided.
Outcome indicators
Number of participants who:
Report feeling safe and included in the service/community environment.
Feel free to talk about sexual well-being and gender equity topics with facilitators, friends, partners, others.
Feel free to learn about sexual well-being and gender equity topics without fear or shame (e.g. without fear of parents or other authority figures disapproving).
Report educating others, such as friends, about sexual well-being and gender equity topics.
Report feeling like they belong or have a sense of solidarity with others who attend the space or are part of the programme.
In organizations:
Number of staff who have facilitated safer spaces of shared learning and conversation around sensitive and taboo topics.
Immerse youself in the other Domains
