Myrna Cunningham
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Myrna Kay Cunningham Kain is a
Miskito Miskito may refer to: * Miskito people, ethnic group in Honduras and Nicaragua ** Miskito Sambu, branch of Miskito people with African admixture ** Tawira Miskito, branch of Miskito people of largely Indigenous origin * Miskito language, original la ...
feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...
, indigenous rights activist and medical surgeon from
Nicaragua Nicaragua, officially the Republic of Nicaragua, is the geographically largest Sovereign state, country in Central America, comprising . With a population of 7,142,529 as of 2024, it is the third-most populous country in Central America aft ...
. She has participated in political-social processes linked to the struggle for the rights of women and
indigenous peoples There is no generally accepted definition of Indigenous peoples, although in the 21st century the focus has been on self-identification, cultural difference from other groups in a state, a special relationship with their traditional territ ...
in
Latin America Latin America is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geogr ...
. She has been coordinator of the Indigenous Chair of the Intercultural Indigenous University. In September 2010, she obtained an Honoris Causa Doctorate from the
National Autonomous University of Mexico The National Autonomous University of Mexico (, UNAM) is a public university, public research university in Mexico. It has several campuses in Mexico City, and many others in various locations across Mexico, as well as a presence in nine countri ...
, the first time that the UNAM granted such recognition to an indigenous woman. From 2011 to 2013, she was chair of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues of the UN. She served as the chairperson of the
United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues The United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII or PFII) is the UN's central coordinating body for matters relating to the concerns and rights of the world's indigenous peoples. There are more than 370 million indigenous peop ...
until 2012. She is also the president of the
Association for Women's Rights in Development The Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID), formerly the Association for Women in Development, is an international feminist membership and movement support organization committed to achieving gender equality, sustainable development ...
(AWID) where she works to advance the rights of indigenous women and knowledge on indigenous peoples and the impacts of climate change, serving as FAO Special Ambassador for the International Year of Family Farming, adviser to the president of the UN World Conference of Indigenous People, and on boards of the Global Fund for Women, Permanent UN Forum on Indigenous Issues, the Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID), and The Hunger Project. She is currently chairperson of the Center for Autonomy and Development of Indigenous People (CADPI) and vice president of the board of the Latin American and Caribbean Indigenous People Development Fund.


Career


Early career

Cunningham first studied to be a primary school teacher and she worked as a teacher within her Waspam community in northeast of Nicaragua along
Coco River The Wangki river in Miskitu or Río Coco, in Spanish, formerly known as the Río Segovia, Cape River, or Yara River, is a river located on the border of northern Nicaragua and southern Honduras. It is the longest river that runs entirely within t ...
at the border with
Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Ocean at the Gulf of Fonseca, ...
. After several years, she went back to school to study medicine at the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua at León (UNAN-León), and she became the first Miskito doctor in Nicaragua. After completing her studies she returned to the Miskito region where she started to work as a
general practitioner A general practitioner (GP) is a doctor who is a Consultant (medicine), consultant in general practice. GPs have distinct expertise and experience in providing whole person medical care, whilst managing the complexity, uncertainty and risk ass ...
and later as a surgeon. She was active with work in public health within the Waspam community until 1979. During the
Sandinista Revolution The Nicaraguan Revolution () began with rising opposition to the Somoza dictatorship in the 1960s and 1970s, the ouster of the dictatorship in 1978–79, and fighting between the government and the Contras from 1981 to 1990. The revolution r ...
, she worked in the Ministry of Public Health, including in the role of Director of investigation and planning. After the revolution she returned again to the Miskito region where she became the first woman governor of the autonomous region. She helped to negotiate some of the peace agreements after the conflict in Nicaragua, setting the stage for the Law of Autonomy of the Indigenous Peoples and Ethnic Communities from the Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua in 1987. She also helped to create the first autonomous regional government. She served as the Deputy of the Autonomous Region of the North Atlantic Coast in the National Assembly RAAN. During this period, the first normative instruments for the institutionalization of the multi-ethnic regional system in Nicaragua were defined.


Indigenous communities, education, and rights

In 1992 she was the coordinator of the Continental Campaign of indigenous, black and popular resistance and she has been an activist for the individual and collective rights of women and men of indigenous peoples in her country, for the Organization of American States (OAS) and the United Nations (UN). She has been a promoter before international cooperation agencies in the search for funds and development of an external cooperation culturally respectful with indigenous peoples and has worked on intercultural health issues and traditional medicine, in addition to continuing to collaborate with the Autonomous Regional Governments of Nicaragua in the process of establishing Intercultural Health Models. Cunningham has been active for international agencies to search for funds which promote external cooperation with indigenous peoples and she has worked on intercultural health issues and traditional medicine to establishing Intercultural Health Models. In 1994, Cunningham founded the University of the Autonomous Regions of the Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast, one of the first higher education for indigenous people, which has become a model for the continent. Simultaneously, she worked as promoter for Regional Autonomous Education System (Sistema Educativo Autonómico Regional - SEAR). She was the president of the Center for the Autonomy and Development of Indigenous Peoples (Centro para la Autonomía y Desarollo de los Pueblos Indígenas - CADPI), an organization that works in the areas of intercultural communication, cultural revitalization, indigenous women's rights, climate change and its impact on indigenous peoples. She also established an observatory of regional multi-ethnic autonomy in Nicaragua. From 2011 to 2013, she was chair of the
United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues The United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII or PFII) is the UN's central coordinating body for matters relating to the concerns and rights of the world's indigenous peoples. There are more than 370 million indigenous peop ...
. In 2014, she advised the president of the United Nations General Assembly for the Conference of Indigenous Peoples of the UN. She is currently president of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues with the UN, and board member with Women's Rights and Development (AWID). For the Tropical Agricultural Research and the Center for Higher Education she works on the projects to fight hunger and famine and supports a trust fund for Indigenous Peoples. CunninghamCunningham is also the first vice president of the board of directors of the fund for the development of indigenous peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean.


Women's rights

Cunningham is active in defense of women's rights and specifically the rights of indigenous women both in her country and in the continental and global context. She is a member of the board of directors of th
Global Fund for Women and advisor to the Alliance of Indigenous Women of Mexico and Central America
th

and the International Forum of Indigenous Women (Foro International de Mujeres Indigenas - FIMI). In 1994 she was elected to the national directorate of the SNLF as part of a movement to increase women's representation at the highest levels of the SNLF; other women elected at the same time included
Dorotea Wilson Dorotea Wilson Tathum (born 1948) is a Nicaraguan politician and women's rights activist. She was a congresswoman and member of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). She has founded and co-founded a wide range of organisations that ra ...
,
Mónica Baltodano Mónica Baltodano was a commander of the guerrilla revolutionary group known as the Sandinista National Liberation Front during the Nicaraguan Revolution. She worked in the movement for several decades, and after experiencing the corruption and ...
,
Benigna Mendiola Benigna Mendiola (born 1944) is a Nicaraguan socialist, revolutionary, peasant leader and member of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (Spanish: ''Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional'', FSLN). She participated in guerrilla action agai ...
and Dora Maria Tellez.


Recent work

In 2010, the
National Autonomous University of Mexico The National Autonomous University of Mexico (, UNAM) is a public university, public research university in Mexico. It has several campuses in Mexico City, and many others in various locations across Mexico, as well as a presence in nine countri ...
(UNAM), awarded Cunningham an
honorary doctorate An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or '' ad hon ...
. She was the first indigenous woman to receive an honorary degree from UNAM. Cunningham was a member of the Board of Directors of the
Global Fund for Women The Global Fund for Women is a non-profit foundation funding women's human rights initiatives. It was founded in 1987 by New Zealander Anne Firth Murray, and co-founded by Frances Kissling and Laura Lederer to fund women's initiatives aroun ...
and also advised the Alliance of Indigenous Women of Mexico and Central America, the Continental Network of Indigenous Women and the International Indigenous Women's Forum. In 2012, the human rights organization MADRE awarded Cunningham with the Woman of Distinction Award.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cunningham, Myrna Indigenous rights activists Miskito people Nicaraguan feminists Nicaraguan women activists Living people Nicaraguan general practitioners Nicaraguan officials of the United Nations Year of birth missing (living people)