As a woman and a mother of a teenage daughter, equality to my male counterpart is of the utmost importance to me. Do I feel like we have a long ways to go? Yes. I believe women have a steeper climb for promotions, pay, and even more challenging work. Do I think we’ve come a long way? Yes!
National History Month
Women have been pushing their given limits and fighting for their rights year after year. March is the month to celebrate these victories and how far women have come during National Women’s History Month. This is a great opportunity to look at the contributions women have made in history and continue to make today.
The History Behind the Month
Women’s History Month actually started out as Women’s History Week according to National Women’s History Museum. It started out as a celebration in Santa Rosa, California to correspond with International Women’s Day in 1978 and spread across the celebration spread across the country the following year. The following year in 1980, President Jimmy Carter designated March 2-8 National Women’s History Week.
“From the first settlers who came to our shores, from the first American Indian families who befriended them, men and women have worked together to build this nation. Too often the women were unsung and sometimes their contributions went unnoticed. But the achievements, leadership, courage, strength and love of the women who built America was as vital as that of the men whose names we know so well.” ~President Jimmy Carter
Every year the designated week was proclaimed National Women’s History Week with requests and additional resolutions to celebrate March as National Women’s Month. Starting in 1995, each President has proclaimed March as Women’s History Month.
Check Out Library Resources
The Library offers a plethora of information and resources on women throughout history and today. Here are some of my favorites that I’d like to highlight. Take time to peruse the website and find your own favorites.
Adult:
Book: Women: the National Geographic Image Collection
Book: The Purpose of Power: How We Come Together When We Fall Apart by Garza, Alicia
DVD: Women of Impact: Changing the World
Kanopy: Great Unsung Women of Computing Series
Kanopy: Women Make Film Series
Kanopy: Women
Kanopy: A Thousand Girls Like Me
eBook: Women, Race, & Class by Angela Y. Davis
YA Book/eBook: Brazen: Rebel Ladies Who Rocked the World by Pénélope Bagieu
Book/eBook/eAudiobook: The Moment of Lift : How Empowering Women Changes the World by Gates, Melinda
Children:
Book: Not Playing by the Rules: 21 Female Athletes Who Changed Sports by Lesa Cline-Ransome
Book: Women in Art: 50 Fearless Creatives Who Inspire the World by Rachel Ignotofsky
Book: Black Women Who Dared by Naomi M. Moyer
Book: Like a Girl by Lori Degman
Book: Sonia Sotomayor : a judge grows in the Bronx = la juez que creció en el Bronx by Winter, Jonah
Book: Remember the ladies : 100 great American women by Harness, Cheryl
Book: Little dreamers : visionary women around the world by Harrison, Vashti
Kanopy: I could Do That! Esther Morris Gets Women the Vote
Kanopy: Who Says Women Can’t Be Doctors
eBook: She Persisted Around the World : 13 Women Who Changed History. by Clinton, Chelsea
