INDIANAPOLIS – “The suffrage is white.” This is the position of Susan L. Hall-Dotson, coordinator of African American history collections at the Indiana Historical Society in Indianapolis. “It is painful for whites – and white women in particular – to admit that they alienate themselves from other women on theRead More →
Joe Biden’s choice of Senator Kamala Harris as his running mate is rightly heralded as a historic moment for black women. For the first time, a black woman is the presumptive candidate for a big party ticket. This time is coming 100 years after women won the right to voteRead More →
As the new coronavirus has swept through almost every country on the planet, it has hit some populations harder than others. In Rhode Island, Latinos make up 46% of the state’s case count. Nationally, blacks and Latinos are infected at disproportionate rates. And one group is serving massively on theRead More →
On that day 25 years ago, August 11, 1995, a devadasi woman, Yellamma, traveled from Raichur district in Karnataka to Delhi to participate in a historic event. In the presence of over a thousand Dalit women, Yellamma lit the inaugural lamp to establish a pan-Indian network, the National Federation ofRead More →
Again Saturday January 1, 2022 at 9:30 p.m. on KPBS TV + Sunday January 2 at 6:30 p.m. on KPBS 2 / On Demand —A celebration of the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage reflected in popular music— “Rise Up: Songs from the Women’s Movement” celebrates the 100th anniversary of theRead More →
Martha S. Jones has a problem with the word “suffrage.” She’s seen the word frequently in 2020, as Americans mark the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage, with the ratification of the 19th Amendment on August 18, 1920. For her, “suffrage” is reminiscent of the protests led largely by whites. women,Read More →
On the agenda today: Amid unemployment rates stuck in double digits and economic recession, housing prices in Pittsburgh rebound; Black women activists from decades ago continue to influence today’s demands for justice and equality; and confusing messages about the coronavirus in Pennsylvania have one wondering what’s safe. Tighter credit forRead More →
It was 2015 when Mokah Jasmine Johnson decided to enter the world of activism. The use of a racial slur in the name of a drink from a downtown Athens bar was the last straw. She was fed up with the racism in her town and she intended to takeRead More →
Nawara was forced to wear the headscarf when she was 11 years old. Two years ago, she finally decided to take it down and post a new photo of herself on Facebook, and that was the starting point for the defamation assault. “I thought I was no longer in theRead More →
GENEVA (Reuters) – A UN Human Rights Council investigator on Thursday urged member states to pressure Saudi Arabia to release the activists ahead of the G20 nations summit that Riyadh will host in November. FILE PHOTO: Agnes Callamard, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, holds a jointRead More →
This story originally appeared on Alma. The women’s movement is led by Jews…or at least it was in the 1970s. Betty Fridan, Bella AbzugGloria Steinem – they were all Jewish, and they’re all characters from FX’s new show “Mrs. America,” now airing on Hulu. The series, created by Dahvi Waller,Read More →
In March, Iran became the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in the Middle East. From the earliest days of the crisis, the country has been criticized for both mismanagement and manipulation of data for political purposes. The government’s persistence in keeping political detainees locked up despite the looming threat ofRead More →
(Berlin) – Kyrgyz police detained around 70 activists, mostly women, for hours on March 8, 2020 without telling them the reasons for their detention or giving them access to lawyers, Human Rights Watch said today. . The activists had themselves been attacked during the peaceful International Women’s Day march inRead More →
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Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Spain on Sunday evening to participate in walks across the country for International Women’s Day. The reasons for the protest were the same as those which inspired the mass protests of the past two years: gender-based violence, the gender payRead More →
NPR’s Lulu Garcia-Navarro talks to Lina al-Hathloul about her sister, Loujain, who was imprisoned in Saudi Arabia for her women’s rights activism. LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST: This week, a group of feminist activists in Saudi Arabia are due back in court. Among them is Loujain al-Hathloul. The group was jailed inRead More →
RG: When I think about erasing, I think part of it is that they’re trying to erase Bernie, but they’re actually trying to erase the potential of a movement because even if Bernie Sanders gets elected, he doesn’t can’t do all these things alone. It’s actually the working class movementRead More →
BOGOTA (Reuters) – Killings of women engaged in community organizing and human rights advocacy in Colombia rose nearly 50% in 2019 from a year earlier, the United Nations said on Wednesday as it urged the government to redouble its protection efforts. FILE PHOTO: A protester holds a sign reading ‘NoRead More →
© Anton Skavronsky On International Women Human Rights Defenders Day, report examines stories from 21 countries and finds global failure to protect women activists Women activists are being murdered at an increasing rate. Between January 1 and October 1, Front Line Defenders recorded 39 confirmed killings of women activists aroundRead More →
Activists victims of sexual violence, smear campaigns and threats “Governments must live up to their commitment to ensure that these activists can operate freely and safely” – Kumi Naidoo Governments around the world are failing to protect women human rights defenders from mounting attacks, Amnesty International said today. [29 November]Read More →
Rajaa Altalli was working on his doctorate at Northeastern University in 2011 when the Syrian revolution began. Altalli, originally from Syria, immediately began talking to people who have visited detention centers or family members to document human rights abuses. Soon after, in July 2012, she moved to Turkey to helpRead More →
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Meghan Markle made a surprise appearance at a fashion shoot for her new clothing line with London-based charity Smart Works, which helps long-term unemployed women find jobs. The former American actress, who is married to Britain’s Prince Harry, is a patron of the charity whichRead More →
In an open letter to the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, fourteen women’s rights activists called on him to step down and pave the way for a transition to a new political system for Iran. Referring to a similar demand made by fourteen political activists lastRead More →
Screenshot from the video ‘Full interview Doan Trang’ uploaded on May 10, 2019 by the 88 Project on Youtube. A new series of video interviews sheds light on the perspectives and struggles of women involved in human rights activism in Vietnam. The 88 Project, an organization supporting freedom of expressionRead More →
A court official informed some of the women’s relatives that the session would not take place on Wednesday as scheduled. A Saudi court has postponed a fourth hearing in the trial of several women’s rights activists, a case that has intensified Western criticism of Saudi Arabia. A court official informedRead More →
The trials of 11 Saudi women’s rights activists, most of them imprisoned, are expected to continue for another two weeks. Nearly a dozen Saudi women’s rights activists, most of them imprisoned, attended their third hearing on Wednesday and were told their trials would continue for at least two weeks. TheRead More →
Saudi rights group Alqst identified the freed women as Aziza al-Youssef, Ruqayyah al-Muharib and Eman al-Nafjan. All three have been detained as part of a government crackdown on dissent in recent years. “The court will continue to hear their cases and [the newly-freed women] must attend the hearing. The trialRead More →
Tuesday, March 26, 2019 MINDSETTER™ Guest Maureen Martin View larger + Tarana Burke As Women’s History Month draws to a close, it’s a time to honor the outstanding achievements of women throughout history and celebrate the work that continues through various movements and organizations. One such movement, #MeToo, was foundedRead More →
(Beirut) – Saudi Arabia’s charges against women’s rights defenders appear almost entirely linked to their human rights work, Human Rights Watch said today. Saudi Arabia opened individual trials on 13 March 2019 against 11 activists, mostly prominent women’s rights defenders detained from May 2018. Saudi Arabia should immediately release allRead More →
Credit: Michael Goerlitz Fighting oppression is more effective through smaller, more individual grassroots movements, activists told Penn students Monday at a Perry World House panel to mark International Women’s Day earlier this month. . Four speakers from around the world discussed their personal experiences in the fight against sexual violenceRead More →
“The central issue of gender equality is a question of power,” he stressed, noting that we continue to live in a male-dominated world with a male-dominated culture. “Power is not given, power is taken”, he stressed, adding that we “have to step back” against resistance to change “because people doRead More →
Addressing the 63rd session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) in a joint speech, Muniba Mazari and Mary Fatiya both called for basic social protections to be extended to women and girls in the around the world, as needed, and in accordance with their inalienable humanRead More →
GENEVA – Saudi Arabia is using its anti-terrorism laws to silence activists, including women, in violation of international law guaranteeing freedom of expression, United Nations human rights experts said on Monday. The kingdom’s attorney general has started preparing for the trials of the detainees, identified by watchdog groups as women’sRead More →
BAGHAD – Human rights activism is a risky business in the Middle East in general, but this is more true in Iraq where female activists have been targeted. A series of killings in 2018 raised fears of a coordinated campaign to silence successful, outspoken women in Iraq. In August andRead More →
Last week the British Foreign Office celebrated the 70and anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Human Rights Day highlighting the courageous work of human rights defenders around the world. As far as Saudi Arabia is concerned, however, UK government support for human rights defenders is virtually non-existent.Read More →
(Beirut) – Saudi Arabia should immediately allow independent international monitors access to Saudi women’s rights defenders detained since May 2018 to ensure their safety and well-being, Human Rights Watch said today. On November 23, the Saudi media ministry denied evidence published by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International that SaudiRead More →
In 1972, a black cultural center in Berkeley, Calif., is calling on artists to help create a black hero-themed exhibit. An African-American artist, Betye Saar, responded. She created an artwork out of a “mammy” doll and armed her with a gun. According to Angela Davis, a Black Panther activist, Saar’sRead More →
When Iran allowed a select group of women into Tehran’s Freedom Stadium to watch the men’s national football team play, some Iranian women abroad dismissed it as an inconsequential “trick”. But inside Iran, where women activists have fought for equal social rights for decades against a tradition of patriarchy, itRead More →
Women seeking employment often have to overcome the conscious or unconscious gender biases of those who hire, as numerous studies have shown. But women seeking employment also face another hurdle: Guardians in charge of hiring are heavily influenced in their decisions by the biases of the employees the woman wouldRead More →
Jane Fonda in “Feminists: What Were They Thinking?” | netflix In a perfect world, the documentary Feminists: what were they thinking? would simply be a nostalgic film that walks back in time, when women in the 1970s were fighting for equal rights and a recognition that this fight is aRead More →
In 2017, Latin America was described by the UN as the most violent continent in the world for women. Killings of activists and community leaders continued across the region in 2018. As the murder of favela leader Marielle Franco and the uncovering of collusion between the government and privateRead More →
Women’s rights activists Hoda Amid and Najmeh Vahedi were arrested by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) intelligence organization in Tehran on September 1, 2018 and taken to an unknown location, the Center for Human Rights learned. Human Rights in Iran (CHRI). Their arrest took place at their home threeRead More →
(Beirut) – Saudi authorities have arrested internationally recognized women’s rights activist Samar Badawi and Eastern Province activist Nassima al-Sadah in the past two days, Human Rights Watch said today. . Badawi and al-Sadah are the latest victims of an unprecedented government crackdown on the women’s rights movement that began onRead More →
DUBAI (Reuters) – International rights groups have condemned the arrest this week of at least seven prominent Saudi women’s rights activists who previously campaigned for the right to drive, which the conservative kingdom is expected to grant from the next month. The decision to end a decades-old car driving banRead More →
Women have assumed a greater role in the peace and security sectors in the Western Balkans since the end of the Yugoslav wars, thanks to government-sponsored National Action Plans. However, a conservative backlash against gender equality now risks undermining these gains. The momentum in the Western Balkans presents an opportunityRead More →
It has been a year since Ruth Alicia Lopez Guisao, a human rights activist in Colombia, was murdered by unidentified gunmen. She was an outspoken community leader who worked with Afro-Colombian and indigenous groups on land reform in the western department of Chocó. His family had lived for years inRead More →
According to the US Department of Labor, women are a serious “force in the labor market”, accounting for 47% of the country’s workers. Over 39% of these women work in industries where women traditionally constitute the majority of employees. Women also own approximately 10 million businesses in the United States.Read More →
OULAD SEBATA, Morocco — For most of her life, Saida Soukat’s days were filled with farm routines, field work and herding livestock. On a recent Tuesday, she did something quite different, however, speaking to a group of women at their bi-weekly protests demanding an end to the state-sanctioned privatization ofRead More →
If you haven’t already seen Recent column by Cleta Mitchell in the New York Times, it is a must-read. Mitchell, a Washington lawyer who represents conservative causes, joined the women’s movement in the early 1970s. She campaigned for the Equal Rights Amendment and, as a lawmaker in Oklahoma, supported abortionRead More →
Statues of women’s suffrage pioneers Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony and Lucretia Mott in the rotunda of the United States Capitol. MICHAEL MATHES/AFP/Getty Images The Declaration of Independence, which prompted the birth of the United States, noted that all men are created equal. But in the 241 years since,Read More →
On January 21, my husband and I participated in the Women’s March in Reno, Nevada. As we did, I looked around and wondered how many of us weren’t women – or men, for that matter. The temperature was in the 40s, which wasn’t as cold as the winters in myRead More →
March 8 is celebrated annually as International Women’s Day, but this year it will also mark the second major demonstration of resistance by the growing women’s movement launched during the January Women’s March in Washington. Whether you are one of the women participating in Wednesday’s general strike or an allyRead More →
CL, TB In Latin America, the left and the resistance to the resurgence of the right have been embodied in the Vatican. The shadow cast by the pope, who strongly criticizes capitalism on the international scene, has made left-wing criticism tend to gravitate around his example. Meanwhile, feminism offers aRead More →
A history lesson about five women whose internment during World War II inspired them to action. March 27, 2016 This article has been adapted from a previous version published by Densho. From African American activists critical of the 1963 March on Washington to Japanese American women among the 120,000 wrongfullyRead More →
By Kieran Guilbert, Thomson Reuters Foundation DAKAR (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Women’s rights activists condemned the Nigerian Senate on Thursday for rejecting a Gender and Equality Bill that pledged to eliminate discrimination in politics, education and employment , protect women’s land rights and combat violence against women. The Gender andRead More →
By Jasmine M. Ellis In the era of the #SayHerName and #BlackLivesMatter social justice movements, black women have played a key role in protesting injustice across the country. Determined to change the political and racial climate in the United States, they demanded that their voice be heard, while demanding change.Read More →
William Barnett, my paternal grandfather, came to America in 1910 and became a labor organizer with the International Cap Makers Union. Although William was enamored with his newfound freedoms in America and angered by the appalling working conditions of his fellow workers, my grandmother Lottie was not amused. With fourRead More →
When famous feminist activist Mona Eltahawy advanced her theory that women are hated and hated in the Middle East, she faced objections from men and women in various Arab countries. Yet, when you consider the Iraqi model and witness the decline and regression in the status of women and feministRead More →
Amid all the dissection of John F. Kennedy’s legacy this week, one achievement has gone largely unnoticed: her role in launching the modern women’s movement. To be sure, JFK’s record on women (especially in his personal life) was mixed, and his cabinet and political staff were overwhelmingly male. Nevertheless, inRead More →
As the Rana Plaza tragedy in Bangladesh is all too clear, factory jobs in our global supply chain carry significant risks for the millions of people who work in them – the majority of whom are women under the age of 30. Their working life consists of sitting and standingRead More →
Forty years ago, the board of directors of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) determined that women’s rights should be the organization’s highest priority. Then-executive director Aryeh Neier created the ACLU Women’s Rights Project and appointed Ruth Bader Ginsburg as its first director. Since then, Ginsburg has served as aRead More →
WACO, TX– Janet Guthrie has no doubts about her racing skills, but credits the activity of the national women’s movement with opening the doors for her to become the first woman to drive in the Indianapolis 500. “If it weren’t for the disruptive activity of the women’s movement a decadeRead More →