“We end rape culture by doing something incredibly simple that nevertheless, nobody else anywhere on the internet is doing. We end rape culture by showing you how wonderful, great consensual communicative sex is in the real world.” The bold claims are made by Cindy Gallop – a trailblazing woman if ever there was one. An “action oriented” person, as she describes herself, she is aiming to change our shame-based culture around sex. Born in England…
Gracia Mendes Nasi Beatrice de Luna (Dona Gracia) dreamed of a Jewish state, years before Hetrzl. She acted against authorities to protect Jews from Inquisition and settle European Jews.
Juliette Gréco didn’t get off to a promising start. She was born as a product of rape – a fact which her mother kept reminding her of. As a child, her mother sent her and her sister, Charlotte, to live with their grandparents. Her mother took them back after her grandparents died in 1938. Juliette Greco: Fighting in the Resistance in World War 2 With the invasion of the Nazis, the three women joined the…
Queen Nzinga: Who Was She? Queen Nzinga saw the white man come to Africa and take shares of her land. Not only did they take shares of her land, but he kidnapped her people into a life of slavery overseas, in what the white man called “the new world”. She swore to fight the Portuguese conqueror until her last breath, to prevent them from turning her people into slaves.And so she did. From the day…
The Trung Sisters: Who Where They? In the year 40 AD, two extraordinary women revolutionized Vietnam and changed its history forever. Their names were Trung Trac and Trung Nhi, and they are now known as the Trung sisters. They led a successful rebellion against the Chinese Han Dynasty. They were able to rule an independent Vietnam for 3 years before the Chinese managed to conquer the country again. With the reconquering of Vietnam, the sisters…
Her speech, Ain’t I A Woman, is still considered one of the most important and most quoted speeches in the history of the US. Quite an accomplishment for someone who never learned to read or write. A prominent feminist and abolitionist, she was the first Black woman to win a trial against a white man.
Violet Jessop: Early Life When you think of Violet Jessop, “lucky” is a term that comes to mind. She was born in Argentina in 1887 to Irish immigrants. She became ill with what her doctors said was fatal tuberculosis. Somehow, she survived. After her father passed away, her mother decided to move the family to England, where she started to work as a stewardess at sea. Shortly after, her mother became ill and couldn’t work,…
Miram Makeba: Birth & Early Life Miriam Makeba was first sent to prison when she was just 18 months old. It was 1932, the height of the Great Depression. Her mother, Regina Makeba, was a Swazi sangoma (traditional healer). She typically worked as a domestic worker, but she also set up an illegal brewery at their home in order to make ends meet. And so Little Miriam spent the first six months of her life…
Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz: Who Was She? Born in 1651, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz was a Mexican nun, scholar, author and feminist. She was a polymath whose mastery of multiple fields such as literature, philosophy, science, and music made her a remarkable figure in history. At the ripe age of 17, she proved to be an intellectual powerhouse when she debated Mexico’s leading experts and won. She is widely considered one…
African-American women have always been major contributors to literature in the United States, yet often their stories are overlooked or undervalued. However, there is an ever-growing lineup of talented black female authors who are reclaiming their space and making waves. From the earliest days of African-American literature to now, these writers have created powerful works that explore topics such as race, family dynamics, motherhood, freedom and relationships – and their stories are just as important…
Lyudmila Pavlichenko: Early Life When she was a teenager, Lyudmila Pavlichenko heard her neighbor’s son say that women can’t shoot – and she got angry. She decided that she would prove him wrong – and become the world’s best sniper along the way. And so she did. Pavlichenko, who was born in the Ukraine in 1916, signed up for a local shooting class and got a sniper certification within several months. Lyudmila Pavlichenko: ww2 When…
Born as a slave, Harriet Tubman became the woman who led the most slaves to their freedom. She aunderwent brain surgery without anesthesia and was also the first woman to lead an attack in the U.S. military. These are just ways to describe Harriet Tubman, a woman who was born a slave, managed to escape, and instead of enjoying the life of freedom in the north – devoted her life to helping others.
