While Women’s History Month has a long history, some collegiates think it could be more inclusive of a variety of women.
“I do think Women’s History Month is impactful, as long as it is inclusive,” said senior psychology major Jessica Pickens. “I can only speak from my experiences, but growing up the celebration of women throughout history was not very inclusive. If women weren’t important within STEM fields, they weren’t mentioned. Additionally, many important women of color were left out of the dialogue related to women’s history.”
Women across the Internet share these sentiments. Barbara Sostaita, a Master’s candidate in religion at Yale University, wrote a blog post for the Huffington Post’s Latino Voices section titled “This Women’s History Month, I Refuse to Celebrate Your Feminism.”
“My Women’s History Month uplifts and elevates women of color who struggle every day to make room for ourselves in hostile spaces and fight to break down structures that keep us down,” Sostaita wrote. “This Women’s History Month, I refuse to celebrate a white feminism that alienates, subjugates and oppresses women of color.”
Everyday Feminism defines White Feminism as “feminism that ignores intersectionality.” The website also defines intersectionality in the following video.
When senior women’s studies major Asma Neblett thinks of ‘Women’s History Month,’ she said she wonders what is implied when we say the word ‘women’?
“Women of color, of cis and genderqueer identities are central to my studies and feminism, so when I use the term ‘women’, I am referring to a range of people who still seem to be tertiary in mainstream projects, such as Women’s History Month,” she said.
Last year, Mayra Diaz, social activist and co-founder of the blog The Megaphone, also wrote a critique of Women’s History Month in a post titled “Oppression is Not Created Equal.”
“While the overall concept of women’s history month is meant to uplift and inspire women everywhere, there remain prevalent issues with women’s history from a collective standpoint,” she wrote.
Classrooms and the media fail to educate people about the “struggles women face due to race and ethnicity, for example,” Diaz explained.
“All women inherently suffer some kind of systematic oppression due to gender discrimination, but that oppression is not created equal across races and ethnicities,” Diaz continued.
“I am unsure if equality can be achieved in any project if all subjects, in this case, women of color, are not prioritized is included,” Neblett said. “If the month of March is about celebrating women, I want to do so transnationally and beyond a limited understand of what women and womanhood is.”
Initially, Women’s History Month was only a week, declared by President Jimmy Carter in 1979, said Suzanne Gould, historian and archivist at American Association for University Women.
After that, “the National Women’s History Project assembled a coalition to advocate for the entire month of March to be set aside to acknowledge the accomplishments of women,” Gould said. “Without a doubt, there is today greater awareness of the contributions of women in growing our nation.”
Neblett and Pickens both said they thought women’s history month could be improved.
“Women’s History Month can inspire women and girls to make their lives whatever they want them to be,” Pickens said, “especially if it is celebrated in an inclusive way that is representative of the many different fields of study and different racial and ethnic backgrounds.”