Thirty Performances That Remade Women's History

From Paste Magazine:

Paste is celebrating with a look back at two decades worth of films and 30 talented female leads whose roles re-told and re-wrote key moments in history. The performances are not ranked (they appear chronologically) and the list is in no way all-encompassing, although we have tried to include a bit of everything and everyone—no actress appears more than once (we’ll make a separate list for Meryl Streep later).

As we’re sticking to biopics and female-centered period pieces, many great performances by many brilliant actresses do not appear, and it must be said that performances by women in comedies, thrillers, and other genres have also worked to re-make history. Similarly, many women who have played alongside male leads have been left out (like Reese Witherspoon in Walk the Line or Laura Linney in Kinsey) but surely will—and do—appear on other lists. It also pained us to leave out Alanis Morissette’s unforgettable cameo as “God” in Dogma, probably the greatest, most accurately cast role ever.

Oksana Loses Her Brave Battle

From the Sydney Morning Herald:

An 18-year-old Ukrainian woman who prosecutors say was gang-raped, half-strangled and then set on fire in an attack that sparked street protests in a provincial Ukrainian town, has died, a hospital official said.

Hundreds of people took to the streets earlier this month after police released two of Oksana Makar's three suspected attackers whose parents had political connections, re-igniting a public debate on corruption in the ex-Soviet republic.

Oksana's story went worldwide after her mother made a video of her lying distraught in her hospital bed and prodded her to describe her attack on camera.

Bat Mitzvah Turns 90

From Philly dot com:

It was a simple walk from her seat to the front of the Society for the Advancement of Judaism, a New York City synagogue. But when 12-year-old Judith Kaplan was summoned by her rabbi father to read from her Bible and recite some blessings, the act was revolutionary.

On a March Saturday in 1922, two years after women in America got the right to vote, Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan broke tradition. He had, in essence, held a coming-of-age ceremony for his daughter, what boys at 13 had celebrated for centuries.

Of course, what Judith performed was not, in fact, identical. She didn’t read directly from the Torah, nor would the ceremony afford her the same synagogue privileges as males. But it did mark a giant step toward religious equality. Ninety years ago this month, it was the first American bat mitzvah.

Donut Dollies

From an article in the Huffington Post by Doug Bradley:

Donut Dollies were single, female college graduates who were used primarily as morale boosters for U.S. combat troops in Vietnam. Many of these young women were as motivated by JFK's call to duty and service as we guys were. But their training manuals instructed them to present themselves as reminders of girlfriends, wives and sisters waiting back home. As one SRAO member told my friend Heather Stur, author of Beyond Combat: Women and Gender in the Vietnam War Era, the donut dollies were to be "nonsexual symbols of purity and goodness." Good luck with that in a combat zone!

Update on Egyptian Virginity Test Case

Following on from this June post on Egypt: Virginity Test On Female Protestors, comes this update from VOA:

Perhaps more surprising than an Egyptian military tribunal finding one of its own not guilty of forcing a "virginity test" on a detainee, is that the case went ahead at all. There are social, economic and political restrictions faced by Egyptian women, and proposals to advance their rights.

Samira Ibrahim, the woman who lost her case of sexual assault against a military doctor Sunday, not only took on Egypt's leadership but also the nation's deeply conservative attitudes toward women.

Human Rights Watch researcher Heba Morayef said the military rulers took full advantage of those views.

“Samira has had many different battles to fight and also has to deal with the kind of reputational smearing that went on in the media, and in particular, as a result of statements by military generals who, as early as April, went on saying the women who spent the night in Tahrir [Square, protesting], or the women who went to Tahrir, were women of bad morals and ill repute,” said Morayef.

Women took a large part in the 18-day uprising last year that brought down long-time president Hosni Mubarak. But according to political analyst Rania el-Malki, “on Day 19, everything changed.”

Girl Scouts Turn 100

From WJLA:

Known for their dangerously delicious cookies, the Girl Scouts are turning 100. The anniversary comes on the same month as Women’s History Month. To commemorate both, D.C.’s Madame Tussauds has announced the creation of a wax figure of Girl Scout’s founder Juliette Gordon Low.

The figure of Low will debut this May. Monday’s announcement comes ahead of a series of initiatives celebrating the Girl Scouts' anniversary—leading up to the Girls Scouts Rock the Mall event in June. The event, which is a sing along, will host over 200,000 girls and adults on the National Mall.

"Juliette Gordon Low is a national icon whose legacy lives on through the Girl Scouts and the millions of girls and women who have benefited from what she started so many years ago," said Dan Rogoski, General Manager of The Presidents Gallery by Madame Tussauds.

Canonisation of Hildegard von Bingen

From Huffington Post:

The Catholic Church seems ready to codify what music lovers have known for nearly a millennium: Hildegard von Bingen is a saint. Vatican Insider reports that Pope Benedict XVI will canonize the visionary Medieval composer this coming October.

Whether you're a confirmed Catholic, an apocalyptic atheist or a devout druid, if you haven't tuned in to Hildegard's work, you could be in for a revelation.

Women of Note

From Limelight Magazine:

Australia may be known as the lucky country, but it must not have seemed that way to many of the homegrown female composers of the past century as they struggled to be taken seriously in their field. Margaret Sutherland's psychiatrist husband discouraged her from composing by diagnosing her as mentally insane; Miriam Hyde was advised by a publisher to adopt “M. Hydekovsky” as her nom de plume; Peggy Glanville-Hicks declared that a woman must be not as good as men but better in order to succeed – and she wasn’t just talking about composing.

It is these attitudes to women creating music and making their voices heard that prompt journalist Rosalind Appleby to describe classical composition as a “battleground”. It’s the subject of her new book Women of Note, which has its Sydney launch at the Australian Music Centre on March 8 for International Women’s Day.

Afghan Women Trapped In Tribal Law System

From CBS News World Watch:

In Afghanistan, there are essentially two legal systems that exist in parallel. One is the Kabul central government's justice system which, despite years of funding from the US and the international coalition, is rife with corruption, widely discredited and virtually disregarded by the populace. The other track is built around traditional legal practices, including ba'ad, and the cases are heard by local, tribal courts.

"In the tribal courts, the first sacrifice is women," Sirran said. "Always. If there is a fight for land, for water, if there is violence, a girl can be given in ba'ad to settle these things."

Despite a decade of hard work and significant investment by the international community to improve the lives of women after the fall of the Taliban government, the problem of violence continues to grow.


Read more of Sakina's story here.