It’s that time of the month again! And we’re Marching right into sharing our favorite stories with everyone. We’ve gone through our playlists and sifted through the books we’ve been reading. We’ve got our choice of creators and went through our queue to find the best TV Series and Movies that we’ve been streaming.
What’s The Story Of Women’s History Month?
Women’s History is Indigenous History, Immigrant’s History, Black History, and Asian History. Women’s History is Transgender, nonbinary, and cisgender history. Women’s history is for the Newborns and Elders who were our past, are our present, and will be our future. They are Scientists, Professors, Organizers, and Movement builders. They are Doctors, Farmers, and Mechanics. Not only that, but they are Prime Ministers, a Vice-President of the United States, and Stay-at-home Parents.
This list, like many, could go on and on, but this history, is the story of all of us. It’s the story of our siblings, our parents, our friends, our family, our coworkers, and our partners. We all have loved ones and their histories and our histories should be honored and cherished.
History has been told with only one subject at the center of centuries of conversation: white men. That’s why we have decided to dedicate March to anything that has to do with Women’s History. We will be paying tribute to the many perspectives of the distinct, diverse Women throughout history. Women have always been present, as so should their stories be. It’s an honor to tap into a rich and unrecognized history to celebrate the women in our lives.
Consider checking out regional bookstores like the two listed below to fulfill your reading needs that have many of the titles below and many more!
715.779.5223
STORE HOURS
Tuesday-Saturday: 10:00am-5:00pm
Sunday: 11:00am-4:00pm.
- Check out their online inventory!
- Get a book-of-the-month subscription! .
- Take advantage of curbside pickup!
- Sign up for regular free Zoom Author events!
- Masks required
715.292.6402
STORE HOURS
While the doors are not open for in-store shopping, Spinster Books has made every effort to ensure there’s access for folks in Ashland to buy books locally.
- Browse their online inventory!
- Send a message on facebook to initiate your order!
- Curbside Pickup is available!
- Sign up for regular free Zoom Author events!
Holding Our World Together: Ojibwe Women and the Survival of Community
Summary: A groundbreaking exploration of the remarkable women in Native American communities. Too often ignored or underemphasized in favor of their male warrior counterparts, Native American women have played a more central role in guiding their nations than has ever been understood. Many Native communities were, in fact, organized around women’s labor, the sanctity of mothers, and the wisdom of female elders. In this well-researched and deeply felt account of the Ojibwe of Lake Superior and the Mississippi River, Brenda J. Child details the ways in which women have shaped Native American life from the days of early trade with Europeans through the reservation era and beyond.
The latest volume in the Penguin Library of American Indian History, Holding Our World Together illuminates the lives of women such as Madeleine Cadotte, who became a powerful mediator between her people and European fur traders, and Gertrude Buckanaga, whose postwar community activism in Minneapolis helped bring many Indian families out of poverty. Drawing on these stories and others, Child offers a powerful tribute to the many courageous women who sustained Native communities through the darkest challenges of the last three centuries.
The Girl Who Smiled Beads: A Story of War and What Comes After by Clemantine Wamariya and Elizabeth Weil
Summary: Clemantine Wamariya was six years old when her mother and father began to speak in whispers when neighbors began to disappear, and when she heard the loud, ugly sounds her brother said were thunder. In 1994, she and her fifteen-year-old sister, Claire, fled the Rwandan massacre and spent the next six years migrating through seven African countries, searching for safety—perpetually hungry, imprisoned and abused, enduring and escaping refugee camps, finding unexpected kindness, witnessing inhuman cruelty. They did not know whether their parents were dead or alive.
When Clemantine was twelve, she and her sister were granted refugee status in the United States; there, in Chicago, their lives diverged. Though their bond remained unbreakable, Claire, who had for so long protected and provided for Clemantine, was a single mother struggling to make ends meet, while Clemantine was taken in by a family who raised her as their own. She seemed to live the American dream: attending private school, taking up cheerleading, and, ultimately, graduating from Yale. Yet the years of being treated as less than human, of going hungry and seeing death, could not be erased. She felt at the same time six years old and one hundred years old.
In The Girl Who Smiled Beads, Clemantine provokes us to look beyond the label of “victim” and recognize the power of the imagination to transcend even the most profound injuries and aftershocks. Devastating yet beautiful, and bracingly original, it is a powerful testament to her commitment to constructing a life on her own terms.
The Last Girl by Nadia Murad
Summary: Nadia Murad was born and raised in Kocho, a small village of farmers and shepherds in northern Iraq. A member of the Yazidi community, she and her brothers and sisters lived a quiet life. Nadia had dreams of becoming a history teacher or opening her own beauty salon.
On August 15th, 2014, when Nadia was just twenty-one years old, this life ended. Islamic State militants massacred the people of her village, executing men who refused to convert to Islam and women too old to become sex slaves. Six of Nadia’s brothers were killed, and her mother soon after, their bodies swept into mass graves. Nadia was taken to Mosul and forced, along with thousands of other Yazidi girls, into the ISIS slave trade.
Nadia would be held captive by several militants and repeatedly raped and beaten. Finally, she managed a narrow escape through the streets of Mosul, finding shelter in the home of a Sunni Muslim family whose eldest son risked his life to smuggle her to safety.
Today, Nadia’s story—as a witness to the Islamic State’s brutality, a survivor of rape, a refugee, a Yazidi—has forced the world to pay attention to an ongoing genocide. It is a call to action, a testament to the human will to survive, and a love letter to a lost country, a fragile community, and a family torn apart by war.
Somewhere Inside: One Sister's Captivity in North Korea and the Other's Fight to Bring Her Home by Laura Ling and Lisa Ling
Summary: “Somewhere Inside is the electrifying, never-before-told story of Laura Ling’s capture by the North Koreans in March 2009, and the efforts of her sister, journalist Lisa Ling, to secure Laura’s release by former President Bill Clinton. This riveting true account of the first-ever trial of an American citizen in North Korea’s highest court carries readers deep inside the world’s most secretive nation while it poignantly explores the powerful, inspiring bonds of sisterly love.”
Podcasts
The History Chicks
A summary: “Two women. Half the population. Several thousand years of history. Women’s History Podcast/Website with new episodes every two weeks!
From Marie Antoinette to the Harvey Girls, these ladies focus on the history of women throughout the history of the world.”
What's Her Name
Summary: “What’sHerName women’s history podcast is hosted and produced by academic sisters Dr. Katie Nelson and Olivia Meikle. Committed to reclaiming forgotten history, What’sHerName tells the stories of fascinating women you’ve never heard of (but should have). Through compelling interviews with guest historians, writers, and scholars, Olivia and Katie bring to life the “lost” women of history. Fascinating and funny, thought-provoking and thoughtful, What’sHerName restores women’s voices to the conversation.”
Music
Resistance Revival Chorus
“The Resistance Revival Chorus (RRC) is a collective of more than 60 women, and non-binary singers, who join together to breathe joy and song into the resistance, and to uplift and center women’s voices.”
I’m Every Woman by Whitney Houston
Woman by Kesha
Respect by Aretha Franklin
You Don’t Own Me by Leslie Gore
The Battle Hymn of Women from the TV Series, “Mrs. America”
Most streaming services have already created wide selections of movies, tv shows, documentaries, and more to chose from. Most platforms have built playlists that focus on Black stories and history and are constantly evolving and growing. Here are just a few of the many titles that we loved!
