History Becomes Her

Caroline Criado Perez is an author and feminist campaigner. Tracy King is a writer and campaigner. Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez exposes the erasure of women in a world that’s been designed BY men FOR men — and men alone. In this world, women sit shivering in offices set to male temperatures, they hold phones that are too big for their hands, they struggle to reach the rail on the tube set to a male height. But discomfort is just one part of the puzzle. This data gap is also putting women’s lives at risk. Invisible Women delves into the consequences of not collecting data specific to women and proves that decision-makers in urban planning, transportation, policy, design, science, and manufacturing are overlooking the needs of half the world's population. Writer and campaigner Tracy King ran a successful crowdfunding campaign to send a copy of the book to every MP in the country in the hope that lawmakers will take action against the gender data gap at the heart of this systemic discrimination. Those books have now been delivered to every single MP.

This episode is the Season One finale of History Becomes Her. We'd like to say a massive thank you to all our lovely listeners for tuning in to our very first season.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9.

Special thanks to Tracy King, Caroline Criado Perez, and 89up.

Credits:

Host and creator: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jess Phillips is the Member of Parliament for Birmingham Yardley and the author of Truth to Power and Everywoman. When she’s not standing up in the House of Commons, calling out the prime minister for playing “bully-boy games” during Brexit votes, she’s shedding light on the reality of being a woman in politics. That reality is pretty terrifying. She receives death and rape threats every day of her life. And one night received 600 rape threats in one night. She has panic alarms installed in her home and office. 

On 16 June 2016, Phillips’s friend, the MP Jo Cox, was assassinated by a far-right terrorist in her constituency. We spoke to Phillips about Jo Cox, and how she should be remembered. In this episode, Phillips talks about her admiration for Annie Kenney, the working-class suffragette and socialist feminist. She also discusses the lessons we can learn from Daphne Caruana Galizia, the Maltese journalist and anti-corruption activist who was murdered in October 2017. Phillips also pays tribute to the activists behind Ireland's Repeal The 8th campaign to legalise abortion.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9.

Special thanks to Jess Phillips MP, Midas PR, and Octopus Books.

Credits:

Host and creator: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Vicky Spratt and Diane Munday are campaigning to decriminalise abortion in England, Scotland, and Wales.

Diane Munday campaigned to legalise abortion in Britain in the 1960s. Her activism has not only changed women’s lives in this country — but saved them. Munday had a termination in 1961, when it was illegal. Her husband’s salary meant she was able to afford the procedure. But a friend of hers who had a backstreet abortion died. She went on to fight for the legalisation of abortion in Britain. Over 50 years after the 1967 Abortion Act was passed, Munday is fighting for legal reform.

Along with journalist Vicky Spratt, Munday is fighting for the decrimalisation of abortion in England and Wales. Spratt has also changed the law. Her #MakeRentingFair campaign resulted in the government banning letting agency fees for tenants. 

Now, Spratt and Munday — two women who’ve already changed the law — are campaigning legal reform with Refinery29's #ImACriminal campaign. Listen to the episode to find out more about this important campaign. You can sign their Change.org petition here.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9.

Special thanks to Refinery29, Vicky Spratt, Diane Munday, and Nina Joyce.

Credits:

Host and creator: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sofie Hagen is a Danish comedian who co-created the Guilty Feminist podcast with Deborah Frances White. Hagen is non-binary and uses pronouns she/they/he. Hagen is a fat acceptance campaigner and plus size fashion designer, who speaks candidly about our culture’s ingrained anti-fat bias and the subtle and overt ways society continues to marginalise and discriminate against fat people. 

In this episode of History Becomes Her, Hagen discusses her admiration for civil rights activist Rosa Parks. Hagen also shares how she got started in the fat acceptance movement and how people can unlearn their ingrained anti-fat bias. In her book Happy Fat Hagen writes about the reality of being fat in a world that wants you to take up less space. She talks about being spat on and having someone tell her, “if you weren’t so fat, I’d rape you.” Hagen wants to reclaim the word “fat” and live in a world built on self-acceptance and loving your body.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9.

Special thanks to Sofie Hagen and HarperCollins.

Credits:

Host and creator: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Akilah Hughes is a writer, comedian, YouTuber, and podcaster. Hughes is the co-host of Crooked Media's What A Day podcast and one of the few black women hosting a daily news podcast. Podcasting has a representation problem. There are more podcasts than ever before, but women and people of colour are still sorely underrepresented as hosts, especially when it comes to daily news.

This week's episode is hosted by Jess Joho, a staff writer at Mashable based in Los Angeles. In this episode, Hughes discusses representation in podcasting, her book Obviously: Stories from My Timeline, and how she practices self-care as someone reporting on daily news. In the episode, Hughes shares her admiration for Constance Baker Motley, an African-American civil rights activist and and the first African American woman to become a federal judge. Motley was the assistant attorney to Thurgood Marshall arguing the case Brown v. Board of Education, a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. Motley was the first black woman to serve in the New York State Senate and the first woman to be Manhattan Borough President. Motley was a lead trial attorney for a number of significant civil rights cases, and represented Martin Luther King, Jr., the Freedom Riders, and the Birmingham Children Marchers. She was widely regarded as the leading courtroom strategist of the civil rights movement.

Important note: This episode was recorded in February 2020, during Black History Month in the U.S. when the Democratic Primaries were in full swing.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Jess Joho on Twitter @jessjoho. You can find Akilah Hughes on Twitter @AkilahObviously.

Special thanks to Akilah Hughes and Jess Joho.

Credits:

Host: Jess Joho

Creator: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ruth Hunt is one of Britain’s leading LGBTQ campaigners. She has played a central role in campaigning for same sex marriage in England and Wales and access to fertility treatment for lesbians. After becoming chief executive of LGBTQ rights charity Stonewall in 2014, Hunt spearheaded the organisation's commitment to campaigning for trans equality. She is credited with transforming Stonewall from an LGB charity to a fully trans-inclusive LGBTQ charity during her tenure.

Stonewall was founded in the UK as a response to Section 28 — a law passed in 1988 by Margaret Thatcher that stopped councils and schools "promoting the teaching of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship." In this episode of History Becomes Her, Hunt discusses how this law affected people who went to school during the time this legislation was in effect and reflected on her own experience growing up in that era. Hunt also talks about about the straightwashing and erasure of LGBTQ history and her love for author Virginia Woolf.

Hunt left Stonewall in 2019, and that year, she was made a Crossbench peer in the House of Lords. She now runs Deeds and Words, a consultancy that works to build inclusive cultures in workplaces. Her book, The Book of Queer Prophets: 24 Writers on Sexuality and Religion, is out now.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9. 

Special thanks to Ruth Hunt and Deeds and Words.

Credits:

Creator and host: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Zing Tsjeng is a journalist and the author of the Forgotten Women book series. These four books provide fascinating biographies of the leaders, scientists, artists, and writers who are notably absent from our history books. As Tsjeng notes in her books, women account for around half of the world’s population, but they only occupy around 0.5% of recorded history. For those of us who grew up learning a lot about Henry VIII, Oliver Cromwell, Christopher Columbus, and Abraham Lincoln, you might have wondered what women were getting up to during this time. They were very busy, it turns out. In this episode, we learn about some of the fascinating women who changed the course of history but didn’t get a mention in the books we read at school.

Tsjeng also pays tribute to her grandmother, who smuggled food to British prisoners of war during the occupation of Hong Kong while raising seven children. You'll also learn about U.S.-based peace activist Concepción Picciotto, Chinese pirate leader Ching Shih, and the Mirabal Sisters, who opposed the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo in the Dominican Republic. 

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9. 

Special thanks to Zing Tsjeng and Octopus Publishing Group.

Credits:

Creator and host: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Lisa Taddeo spent eight years writing Three Women — a bestselling book that has been hailed “the deepest nonfiction portrait of desire” ever written. Taddeo drove across America six times to spend thousands of hours with the three women whose stories shed light on the way women’s sexuality is marginalised. She even moved to the towns they lived in to gain a deeper understanding of their lives. The result is a fascinating deep-dive into the sex lives of three women and the harsh — sometimes devastating — way they are judged by society and the people they know for their sex lives.

In this episode of History Becomes Her, Taddeo talks about the lessons we can learn from the three eponymous women's stories and how we need to change how we talk about women's sexual desire. Taddeo also discusses her admiration for Italian authors Natalia Ginzburg and Elena Ferrante.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9. 

Special thanks to Lisa Taddeo and Bloomsbury Publishing.

Credits:

Creator and host: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Content warning: This episode contains discussion of suicide and grief.

Poorna Bell is an author and journalist who is actively challenging our ingrained beliefs about mental health, loss, and strength. Bell is also a powerlifter and writes about the stereotypes and cultural barriers faced by South Asian women when it comes to sport. In this episode of History Becomes Her, Bell talks about how lifting weights helped her find inner strength after the death of her husband in 2015. Bell also discusses how she moved forward with her grief, how she came to terms with societal stigmas and stereotypes surrounding grief and being widowed, and how she feels about the term 'moving on'.

Bell's new book In Search of Silence (Simon & Schuster) tells the story of how she rebuilt her life and moved forward with her grief.

If you want to talk to someone or are experiencing suicidal thoughts, call the Samaritans (UK) on 116 123. If you're in the U.S., text the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 or call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255. For international resources, this list is a good place to start.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9. 

Special thanks to Poorna Bell, Simon & Schuster, and Siren Talent Management.

Credits:

Creator and host: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Gina Martin is an activist, campaigner, author, and law-changer. In the summer of 2017, Martin was at a music festival when she was upskirted by a man in the crowd. The term upskirting refers to the violating act of taking photos or videos under a person's clothes without consent in an effort to capture a person's crotch area, underwear, and genitals. When Martin reported what happened to the police, she was told there wasn't much they could do. What she later learned was that upskirting was not a criminal offence in England and Wales. Martin launched a campaign called #StopSkirtingTheIssue, initially setting out to raise awareness of the prevalence of upskirting, but after two years of hard work, determination, and lobbying the government, Martin successfully changed the law in England and Wales.

Martin made upskirting illegal, and under the new legislation those convicted of the crime face up to two years in prison. In the year since the law change, four men have been jailed and 16 men have been convicted of the crime, according to figures from the Crown Prosecution Service. In this episode of History Becomes Her, Martin speaks to host Rachel Thompson about how she brought about tangible change through activism, as well as the challenges and hurdles she faced in her campaign. Martin also shares her admiration for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the U.S. Representative for New York's 14th congressional district, and the youngest woman ever elected to congress.

Martin's book Be The Change tells the story of how she went about building a campaign from the ground up, and it's a useful toolkit for anyone wanting to bring about change in the world.

Please subscribe, rate, and review. Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Rachel on Twitter @RVT9. 

Special thanks to Gina Martin, Gleam Titles, and Little, Brown Book Group. 

Credits:

Creator and host: Rachel Thompson

Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov

Editor: Shannon Connellan

Music: Christianne Straker

Illustration: Vicky Leta

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.