A century of International Women’s Day (From The Argus)

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A century of International Women’s Day

11:24am Saturday 5th March 2011

By Claire Banks - Contented Mummy »

This Tuesday is the centenary of International Women's Day. The event was initially started in 1911 to campaign for equal workers rights, be trained, hold public office and most notably have the vote. We have seen the role of women in society change dramatically since then through two world wars, creation of the women's movement and evolution of technology and telecommunications.

The fact this day has been observed for 100 years had a profound effect on me. I tried to imagine what life would have been like for me in 1911. I decided to examine the generations of women in my family over the last century and map their path to me. One thing they had all in common is they took advantage of the opportunities laid out to them, led the desire to increase their earning potential.

On both sides of my parents family, our roots are firmly in working classes. My maternal grandmother left school at 14 like many of her contemporaries and began an apprenticeship with a confectioners, which she didn’t like and left after a year. Before the Second World War broke out she had the opportunity to go to night school, free of charge, to learn shorthand and typing. August 1939 she turned 17 and the family had moved from Liverpool to Halifax, West Yorkshire. Women were enlisted to work in factories for the war effort, usually if they had no dependents, making parts that they understood (but never knew exactly) to be used by the Navy. Women were needed to fill the gap left by men serving in the armed forces but despite this, were still paid less than their male counterparts. 1943 After the war, she married and started a family but continued to work. Nana explains to me, ’We wanted to boost our income, to buy appliances such as washing machines and televisions.’. She went back to night school in the 1960’s which allowed her access to office work and eventually the civil service, who didn‘t usually take on married women but opportunities had changed since the war.

My paternal grandmother was the daughter of a carpenter. Despite having already started a family before the war, she helped out at her husbands family business running a grocers shop, as well has raising her son, while he was away serving in the army. After the war, she went on to work at Alders department store earning an apprenticeship and eventually becoming supervisor of the ladies fashion department. She also continued to work while raising my father who was a baby boom child, 10 years younger than his brother born just before WW2. As a child she’d show me the clothes she had bought with her staff discount at the time of her working there, all kept neatly in their original cellophane packaging. Her taste was impeccable. They were equally both proud of having paid off their mortgage by retirement, owning a home outright was a big achievement for their generation and it was down to their dual income that made it possible.

For very similar reasons, my mother pushed herself up the promotion ladder to earn a better living. The swinging sixties wasn’t completely revolutionary for women depending on where you lived or your social background. The likelihood was you wanted to leave school as early as possible and earn money to buy the latest fashions, Rolling Stones records and have a fairly decent social life. My mother’s family had relocated from south London to near Gatwick airport for her father’s work. The growth of the airport presented more job opportunities in the area plus the perks of foreign travel which she made the most of before married life and children. Even though she worked part-time jobs when my sister and I were at school, it wasn’t until we were in our teens and could fendr for ourselves after school (and Saturday jobs of our own) did she start a career culminating in becoming Studio Manager for Filofax, co-ordinating the print production and content of diary inserts. It was her extra salary that enabled me to go to University in 1992 and I was the first girl on both sides of my immediate parents family to go.

Although going on to further education was symbolic for my parents and grandparents generation, in 1992 it didn’t and still doesn’t necessarily guarantee social and economic mobility for women. We can’t deny that more women are moving into typical male dominated professions and more women are having careers and starting their own businesses. It seems to all fall down when women want to start a family, the environment for maintaining a career and bringing up a family becomes more challenging either through lack of support from employers or simply the nature of the jobs themselves. In my view, there is some way to go for complete gender equality in the workplace and across many communities all over the world which is why as well as celebrating our achievements on Tuesday, it will be a time to reflect and discuss what more can be done. Especially the difference we can make for our children.

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Comments(3)

anubis says...
4:05pm Sat 5 Mar 11

Pleased to read your piece on ‘International Women's Day’, Claire, but as I continued reading, increasingly disappointing. Surely you ignore two major policy aspects of the original founders? I refer to the struggles on which today’s advances are based, and the international aspect, included in the title.

You are rightly proud of your working class ancestry; working class women always the major campaigners, making the greatest sacrifices; my disappointment came from an historical presentation suggesting the MINIMAL advances that HAVE been achieved have miraculously ‘come about’ through ‘the passing of time’ and ‘general enlightenment’ of the population. Your Gran’s reminiscences are invaluable, Claire, but there is need to include ‘the broader movement’, the years of struggle and sacrifice that made these advancements inevitable.

Of course, that’s the way history is usually presented by propagandists representing the ‘status quo’ – ask the average ‘person in the streets’ what they know about suffragettes and you’ll be told of females carrying ‘votes for women’ posters and/or handing out white feathers to young men during the 1914-18 War; unaware of the physical attacks on members of the cabinet, rowdy street demonstrations, shattered windows, leading to the famous letter in the ‘Daily Telegraph’, February 1913, suggesting there were “only two ways to halt suffragette violence: (1) kill every woman in the UK, or (2) give them the vote. Almost a century later, we have the award winning film of the Dagenham women ….

The early victories were closely related to organized political campaigns, massive street demonstrations through lines of jeering and hostile police, cabinet ministers stoned, wide press advertising (and reported activities), linking themselves with similar activities elsewhere in Europe – and, of course, Sylvia Pankhurst, one of the founder members of the British Communist Party, corresponded with and talked with Lenin about these specific matters – in the days when that Party had close links with working class unions and bodies, (long before its isolation and degeneration under Stalin).

Remember, it is ‘INTERNATIONAL Women's Day’, Claire; your second major omission is the plight of women in ALL counties where religion (ALL religions are equally guilty) has a major function in determining social attitudes to sex and gender.
Perhaps others will make contributions to this (second) very important aspect?

Pleased to read your piece on ‘International Women's Day’, Claire, but as I continued reading, increasingly disappointing. Surely you ignore two major policy aspects of the original founders? I refer to the struggles on which today’s advances are based, and the international aspect, included in the title. You are rightly proud of your working class ancestry; working class women always the major campaigners, making the greatest sacrifices; my disappointment came from an historical presentation suggesting the MINIMAL advances that HAVE been achieved have miraculously ‘come about’ through ‘the passing of time’ and ‘general enlightenment’ of the population. Your Gran’s reminiscences are invaluable, Claire, but there is need to include ‘the broader movement’, the years of struggle and sacrifice that made these advancements inevitable. Of course, that’s the way history is usually presented by propagandists representing the ‘status quo’ – ask the average ‘person in the streets’ what they know about suffragettes and you’ll be told of females carrying ‘votes for women’ posters and/or handing out white feathers to young men during the 1914-18 War; unaware of the physical attacks on members of the cabinet, rowdy street demonstrations, shattered windows, leading to the famous letter in the ‘Daily Telegraph’, February 1913, suggesting there were “only two ways to halt suffragette violence: (1) kill every woman in the UK, or (2) give them the vote. Almost a century later, we have the award winning film of the Dagenham women …. The early victories were closely related to organized political campaigns, massive street demonstrations through lines of jeering and hostile police, cabinet ministers stoned, wide press advertising (and reported activities), linking themselves with similar activities elsewhere in Europe – and, of course, Sylvia Pankhurst, one of the founder members of the British Communist Party, corresponded with and talked with Lenin about these specific matters – in the days when that Party had close links with working class unions and bodies, (long before its isolation and degeneration under Stalin). Remember, it is ‘INTERNATIONAL Women's Day’, Claire; your second major omission is the plight of women in ALL counties where religion (ALL religions are equally guilty) has a major function in determining social attitudes to sex and gender. Perhaps others will make contributions to this (second) very important aspect? anubis

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Claire Banks says...
11:24am Sun 6 Mar 11

I don't disagree but this was purely an examination of my family, one viewpoint. I only wanted to post a few hundred words but when I started writing I realised how vast this topic is. This is me examining my roots in the light of IWD on Tuesday and how I became the first girl in my immediate family to go to Uni. Nothing more, nothing less.
And I think you'll find in the last paragraph I quite clearly state there's plenty to be done in this world in many communities across the world. Hopefully this blog will point people into the right direction of how they can do more to help or raise awareness.

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kateh1 says...
8:12am Tue 8 Mar 11

I applaud Claire for raising our awareness of the personal implications of this day - I'm listening to Radio Four's flagship news programme: not a mention so far. There are of course enormous inequalities and injustices in all parts of the world, including isolated older women as well as mothers and women in employment. Although I consider myself fairly in touch with current events, I did not know IWD was 100 years old, I imagined it to be a creation of the 60's baby boomers - of which I am one! Sometimes I reflect on how proud and amazed my grandmothers would be if they could know about my life - foreign travel and careers were not options for them - both were in service at the age of 14, neither ever got on a plane, nor worked outside the home after marriage(I guess they would have been too old for second world war work). So thanks for your reflections and thoughts, both of you, it's great to read such thought provoking blogs on line!

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