There are many reasons to love the month of March. It is the month where we set our clocks back and get excited about Spring making its return. For college basketball fans it’s a time when they can go all out for their favorite teams, and it’s also my birthday month. But as we approach the last weeks of the month, it is important to remember that March is Women’s History Month. March 8th is coined the International Women’s Day, which generally gets the most global awareness, but why stop there when we have the entire month? It is not just a day that comes with hip Snapchat filters so that you can take cute selfies with your girls and post them everywhere. While that is fun (I too am guilty of this), we must acknowledge the real value and importance of this month. Why do we care? Why is it important? What is it doing for the women’s movement? It’s the month when we immerse ourselves in celebrating and learning about all manner of women and their accomplishments. To recognize these women as makers of history will help others understand the female perspective on significant movements in history.
Too many women have gone unnoticed and unacknowledged, even when they have made history. Women have been continuously discredited, overlooked, cheated out of their discoveries and accomplishments. The movie Hidden Figures alone shows the incredible untold story of Katherine G. Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson. They were brilliant African-American women who worked at NASA and served as the brains behind the launch of astronaut John Glenn into orbit. It was a stunning accomplishment that essentially turned around the Space Race, but again, it was kept under wraps.
We can clearly see that women have been refused a chance to create their history up for a very long time. The importance of this month is about the absence of women in our written history. In Western accounts, women have been immensely outnumbered by men when highlighting important moments. History has been overwhelmingly written by men, white men at that, leaving so many influential and accomplished individuals in the dark.
Recognition is important. Know a woman’s name. Know her journey. Know what she did and how. This kind of intellectual legacy is very powerful and very feminist so to speak because it sees her for more than her gender and deteriorates the preconceived idea in society that women aren’t making significant impacts in their fields, in the economy, and in society. History is influential and inspirational for future generations. The people we grow up learning about matter. Knowing that something is possible for someone like you makes all the difference. Celebrating, discussing, and writing about women’s history is crucial as it emphasizes that others can do it too. Being a vocal part of history is one of the ways women of the past influence women today.
The month of March is coming to an end, but we should always continue to acknowledge and celebrate, not only historical accomplishments but also to celebrate the women around us for their stories and all their achievements and capabilities. Take a moment and think, what does women’s history mean to you?
Cynthia J. Koepp is a History Professor at Wells College. Professor Koepp is teaching a course this Spring semester called Women and Gender Studies in Europe, where we discuss the experiences of women (and men) in European history and the various social constructions of gender over time and how it is still prevalent today.
“I’m always pleased that Women’s History Month exists because it is always important to be uncovering and revealing people who have been forgotten or ignored. For me, Women’s History Month is something that goes on all year round. I am always trying to pursue new questions and trying to relate women’s conditions, choices, and possibilities to what they were in the past. Women have accomplished many things that haven’t been acknowledged or buried in diaries. I am really interested in issues of gender itself and trying to understand the ways gender is constructed and because it is constructed, it is ever changing. I was quite taken away by the young women marching in DC. I love seeing young girls being active. I know that the future is going to be so different in many ways because there is a new generation. As more and more women become more active in academia, we will see more things that have been ignored in the past, which is already seen happening today.”
Photo by U.S. Embassy & Consulate