Fierce

Jack Kerouac but make it a girl with braids. Carrie Bradshaw, but without the sex, and also braids. An American Icon. An American Odyssey. American propaganda. Violently so, in some cases. Laura Ingalls Wilder is evergreen. For better or worse. Since the first Little House book was published in 1932, generations of readers have flocked to Laura’s cozy stories of the Ingalls family settling the Western frontier. The series inspired a TV show, pageants, and entire fashion lines. Behind this franchise is a woman who experienced almost a full century of American history. She’d made her first trips in a covered wagon, and eventually flew on a jet plane. Laura Ingalls Wilder’s life and legacy remain as powerful, mesmerizing, controversial, and violent as the America she represents. In a country currently at odds with itself and its history could there be a better time for an exploration of this woman? Listen to Wilder on the iHeartRadio App or wherever you get your podcasts. https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-wilder-112847598/

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Are more women having affairs? Or are they finally just talking about it? Throughout history, women have been stigmatized, ostracized, and so much worse for committing adultery—while men have too often been given a pass. But the truth is that women have the same wants, needs and desires as men despite cultural assumptions. Hosted by journalist Jo Piazza, this groundbreaking podcast series features real women of different ages and backgrounds telling the stories of their affairs, many for the first time. After five years of reporting on marriage in the wildly popular Committed podcast, Jo is now uncovering the other side of monogamy and finding some surprising answers about the motivations behind female infidelity – from sex, to empowerment, to self-esteem, and even love.

In She Wants More, Jo explores the double standard of cheating, unpacking the guilt, shame, and the expectations placed on women. She has candid conversations with women about the affairs that have either strengthened or broken their marriages that will make you feel like you're eavesdropping on an intimate conversation between two friends. These stories will make you question everything you thought you knew about desire, monogamy, and marriage. Listen to She Wants More on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-she-wants-more-107769177/

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Tribeca Talks is a compilation of the most engaging conversations recorded live at the Tribeca Film Festival. In this episode, you’ll hear Barbra Streisand in conversation with Robert Rodriguez at the 2017 Tribeca Film Festival, where the two discussed how she got her start in the industry, the moment she knew she wanted to direct, the power of the will, and so much more.

To listen to this episode, visit https://tribecafilm.com/podcasts/series/tribeca-talks-podcasts. 

To learn more about the programs and events at the Tribeca Film Festival, visit tribecafilm.com.

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In July of 1848, four women sat around Mary Ann M’Clintock’s kitchen table in upstate New York to draft the Declaration of Sentiments to proclaim that all women and men should be equal. In this bonus episode of Fierce we talk to former White House Communications Director Jannifer Palmieri about how she is carrying on M’Clintock’s legacy with her new book She Proclaims: Our Declaration of Independence from a Man's World.

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Years before the United States ratified the 19th amendment, a woman from Montana had already infiltrated Capitol Hill. Jeannette Rankin rose through the ranks of the women’s suffrage movement, bringing an electric energy to every town she visited. Her activism earned her a place on the ballot in 1916, and she landed a seat as a congressional representative for Montana - the first woman to ever achieve this distinction in the United States. As a congressperson, Jeannette became an integral part of 20th century US history from voting against entering World War I, to battling for women’s suffrage on the floor of congress, to making herself known as a pacifist again during World War II and later, the Vietnam War. 

At the end of the episode, Jo is joined by Stephanie Schriock, the president of Emily’s List, to discuss why representation matters now more than ever.

Main Sources

1. Jeannette Rankin: A Political Woman. By: James J. Lopach, and Jean A. Luckowski. 
2. Jeannette Rankin, America’s First Congresswoman, by Peter Aronson
3. When Jeannette Said “No”: Montana women’s response to World War I - by Mary Murphy for Montana: The Magazine of Western History
4. Suffragists Oral History Project: Jeanette Rankin: Activist for World Peace, Women’s Rights, and Democratic Government - Interviews Conducted by Malca Chall and Hannah Josephson
5. Various articles found in the the digital archives of the House of Representatives and the Library of Congress Blog
6. Articles from the NY Times in 1916, and United Press and the Suffragist in 1917
7. From NPR, The First Woman In Congress: A Crusader For Peace by Whitney Blair Wyckoff and The Lone War Dissenter on All Things Considered from Dec of 2001

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Christine Jorgensen never intended to become a celebrity. In 1951, Jorgensen traveled to Europe to obtain special permission to undergo a series of operations, which would help complete her medical transition from male to female, becoming the first American woman to publicly receive this type of surgery. When she returned to the states, the New York Daily News wrote about her under the headline: ’EX GI BECOMES BLONDE BEAUTY.’ Christine’s public persona marked a significant, though often fraught, step towards normalizing transgender identities in the US, and she came to embrace her role as a pioneer within the transgender community. But her story is still unknown to many and the fight is far from over. 

Jo talks about the state of transgender rights with the National Press Secretary of the Human Rights Campaign, Sarah McBride, one of the many activists working today to continue the work Christine began.  

Main Sources

1. Christine Jorgensen: a Personal Autobiography - by Christine Jorgensen
2. A Universal-International News report by Fred Maness with footage of Christine Jorgensen arriving at Idlewild Airport in 1951
3. ‘Ex-GI Becomes Blonde Beauty’, from the New York Daily News in December of 1952
4. ‘Bronx Boy is now a Girl’ from the New York Times in December of 1952
5. An interview with Christine Jorgensen conducted by the BBC in 1970
6. An interview with Christine Jorgensen conducted by Hour Magazine in May of 1984
7. An Associated Press article in the LA Times from June 1986 titled: ‘Famed Transsexual Christine Jorgensen Out of the Spotlight’
8. Uncredited footage and interviews titled ‘Christine in Denmark Parts I and II’
9. Various clips, footage, and reviews of Christine’s stage act referenced throughout the episode.

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Born to freed slaves in 1867, Sarah Breedlove used her creativity, determination and brilliant mind for business to transform herself into the mogul, Madam C.J. Walker. Traveling the country with her hair products, Madam Walker employed legions of saleswomen to both grow her business and to give thousands of black women the skills and confidence to create generational wealth and follow in her footsteps.

Following Madam Walker’s empowering story we reflect on her legacy with The Lip Bar CEO and founder Melissa Butler who cites Madam C.J. Walker as part of her inspiration in founding a makeup line that would suit people of all skin tones.

Main Sources

1. On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C.J. Walker - by A'Lelia Perry Bundles (Now a Netflix series starring Octavia Spencer, the book has been retitled ‘Self Made’)
2. A New York Times article titled ‘Wealthiest Negro Woman’s Suburban Mansion’ published in November of 1917
3. An Associated Press article on Madam C.J. Walker published in the spring of 1919

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Dorothy Arzner wasn’t the first woman to direct films in Hollywood, but she was one of the few who endured. A female director who managed to succeed, for a time, in a man’s world. She worked her way through the studio system, first as a typist, then an editor, until she was trusted as a director. Between the silent era of the twenties and the early forties she made 16 films, and pioneered the use of the boom mic in the process. 

Then, stay for a discussion on the difficulties that still exist for women in the film industry with Sonejuhi Sinha, who recently directed her first film after working for years as an editor, just like Dorothy.  

Main Sources

1. Directed by Dorothy Arzner - by Judith Mayne
2. An extensive Interview with Dorothy Arzner conducted by Karyn Kay and Gerald Peary in 1974 - published first by ‘Cinema’ and then by ‘The British Film Institute’ in 1975.
3. What Women Want: The Complex World of Dorothy Arzner and Her Cinematic Women by Donna R. Casella - Framework: The Journal of Cinema and Media, vol. 50 no. 1-2, 2009, p. 235-270. Project MUSE, doi:10.1353/frm.0.0033.
4. Kate: The life of Katharine Hepburn - by Charles Higham published in 1975
5. Me: Stories of my Life - by Katharine Hepburn published in 1991

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You might not know the name Grace Hopper even though it’s hard to imagine our lives without her work. Born in 1906 to a family of engineers, Grace was fascinated with the mechanics of objects from a young age. She was a no-nonsense dynamo, driven by guts and determination, so when the US entered World War II, Grace knew she had to join the war effort even though the military held few places for women. She nevertheless joined a team at Harvard that was hard at work on the Mark I, a calculating machine…or rather, the first large-scale automatic digital computer in the United States. It became Grace’s job to figure out how to program it. But Grace didn’t just program it, she taught humans to communicate with machines in a way that made every single computing leap since her time possible. 

COBOL—the first computer language—was Grace’s great invention; a leap of imagination that did not only help America win the war, but made the computer vastly more useful than it was originally intended to be.

Grace is the grandmama of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the technological leap that changed the world, and Jo discusses its legacy with Parisa Tabriz, a director of engineering at Google, and proud owner of a cat named Grace Hopper.  

Main Sources 

1. Grace Hopper and the Invention of the Information Age (Lemelson Center Studies in Invention and Innovation series) - by Kurt Beyer
2. An Oral History of Captain Grace Hopper by the Computer History Museum - Interview conducted by: Angeline Pantages - Naval Data Automation Command, in Maryland in December of 1980
3. A 60 Minutes segment entitled ‘The Captain is a Lady’ from March 6, 1983

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Phillis Wheatley’s real name is lost to history. The young girl was named for the slave ship that carried her to the United States from West Africa. Purchased as a house slave in Boston, Phillis defied all the odds to become a prolific poet celebrated around the world and the first African American woman to publish a book of poetry in the United States. Eventually, she used her considerable talents to convince the people who owned her to return her freedom to her. 

The story of Phillis’s complicated journey is followed by a conversation with world renowned poet Nikki Giovanni, who talks to Jo about the origins of African American poetry and the evolving narrative about Phillis Wheatley’s place in history.

Main Sources

1. Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral by Phillis Wheatley, published by Archibald Bell in London in 1773
2. Various publications mentioned throughout the episode which published Phillis Wheatley’s poems and letters during her life.
3. Phillis Wheatley: Biography of a Genius in Bondage - by Vincent Carretta
4. The Trials of Phillis Wheatley: America's First Black Poet and Her Encounters with the Founding Fathers - by Henry Louis Gates
5. The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundtation.org)
6. The Phillis Wheatley Historical Society (http://www.phillis-wheatley.org/)

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