This week, we continue our discussion of women who united in support of different causes to garner influence and effect change with an exploration of women's abolitionist organizations and the origins of the women's movement in America. This episode highlights some inspiring women that we should strive to emulate in our own lives in many ways.

This season, we’ll be delving into the organizations that have served women throughout the fight for equality and equal rights. We’ll also discuss the organizations that serve us today in efforts to pass the Equal Rights Amendment and other national and international legislation with the final aim of equal and equitable existence for all genders. This season begins with American organizations and will branch out into organizations around the world as we go. Come along for this journey and see the power of women united for a cause.

Today, Season Two, episode 1 is about Ladies’ Aid, Relief, and Missionary societies from the mid to late 1800s.  

You might wonder why we’re spending an entire season on women’s organizations? Why are they so important? In this and the coming episodes, you’ll begin to see the importance as we delve into the power of women when they unite, but to me, why these organizations are so central to women’s history is that they gave women a place outside of the home. They gave women something to do, a way to impact their own communities and the world at large. They gave women power to effect change that had previously been reserved for men and a handful of independently wealthy women who defied odds and social norms. Just for fun, maybe we’ll talk about one of those. 

All over the country, people are looking to implement social change. The two best ways to learn to do so effectively are to look at the past to see what worked and what didn't and to consult experts in the area you're looking to improve. In this episode, we'll discuss 9 strategies that made the women's suffrage movement successful and then catch up with author, professor, and CEO Bill Shireman to discuss his book, In This Together: How Republicans, Democrats, Capitalists, and Activists are Uniting to Tackle Climate Change and More, and to understand how his action plan relates to women's rights and the Equal Rights Amendment.

In this week’s episode, we take a brief journey throughout time and the western world to understand the role of women and the evolution of woman’s place. From ancient Sparta to Medieval England, from Victorian times to WWII, the idea of what a woman should be has morphed time and again while maintaining some of the same themes. This is only an introductory look at woman’s place in the world to whet our appetite for more in-depth episodes in the coming weeks.

Let me know what you’re most interested in, and we can look deeper into those topics, and check out our blog and reading list on womansplacepodcast.com!

In this episode, join me, Meredith Busch, for a journey through the history of female education. From Christine de Pizan to Mary Wollstonecraft, from Anne of Green Gable to Catherine II, we'll discuss what's been done for women, how the feminization of teaching helped advance women's access to and desire for education, and how university enrollment of women has surpassed that of men over the last 150 years. For that specific data, see https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d07/tables/dt07_178.asp.

For links to where you can buy the books I mentioned, check out the Woman's Place Reading List.

And for more information about Woman's Place Podcast, check us out on Facebook, Instagram, and womansplacepodcast.com!

An introduction to what Woman's Place is all about!