To celebrate International Women’s Day, three of our Sussex Writes tutors visited Monk’s House along with Sussex University’s social media team. The venue was chosen due to its notoriety as Virginia Woolf’s county retreat – a very fitting spot for IWD!
Source: University of Sussex
We are living in very exciting times – we stand in 2020 having borne witness to many important victories for women over the past decade. All over the globe, from the #MeToo movement taking flight in 2017, to the lift of Saudi Arabia’s driving ban on women driving in 2018, social attitudes and legislation seem to be shifting in the right direction. Yet, there is still a long way to go. Around the world, women and girls are still siloed to the side-lines whilst men and boys stand centre.
If you check the Oxford English Dictionary, equality is defined as “the condition of having equal dignity, rank, or privileges with others; the fact of being on an equal footing.” In accordance to this definition, equality has not yet been achieved. Today it was reported that HSBC’s gender pay gap is at a shockingly high 47%. Period poverty is still rife, with 1 in 10 women across the UK being unable to afford sanitary products. An average of 15 million girls a year are still becoming child brides all over the world. On both a micro and macro level, things need to change.
Source: Business Insider (2019)
It is time to innovate the effort for equality, exploring new avenues of change. In light of this, the theme for 2020’s International Women’s Day is #EachforEqual. But what does ‘#EachforEqual’ actually mean? We asked our three tutors who went to Monk’s House: Jennifer, Sophie, and Abbie. Here is what they said about what ‘#EachforEqual’ means to them:
Jennifer Emelfie: “As a teacher, I’m not oblivious to how our education system contributes to gender imbalance. We are continuously teaching boys to take up powerful roles while relegating the girls to the background: from telling girls that they can’t be scientists or maths gurus, to instructing them that they are not strong enough to compete with boys during PE classes, or making them deputy head girls and assistant class reps while the boys take the main positions, irrespective of whether they’re just as competent or not. These rigid gender divisions play out subtly in the classroom. You hear boys make passive comments like “You can’t do anything, you’re just a girl!” or the PE teacher saying to a boy, “Why are you running like a girl?!”. The boys are also being harmed by misogyny – not just the girls!”
“#EachforEqual highlights the fact that a society cannot progress if only one gender is progressing, and it starts with the kind of conversations that we have in the classroom. For me, #EachforEqual means that it’s also important for men and boys to add their voices to the fight because a win for feminism – a win for women’s and girl’s rights – is a win for all”.
Sophie Mclellen: “The phrase #EachforEqual encompasses a plethora of meanings for different people. I believe it embodies the equal access to opportunities, irrespective of circumstances surrounding birth, sexuality, ethnicity, and the like. Moreover, it invites an exploration and acknowledgement of women’s history, and the unequal circumstances that still surround women globally. The all-encompassing phrase inspires equality both legally and otherwise, whilst acknowledging that legal equality is but one branch of the equality tree, and that social inequalities can be just as damaging towards society. A patriarchal society is not necessarily one that benefits all men at the expense of all women – an unequal system threatens to undermine all people within society”.
Abbie O’Connell: “To me, #EachforEqual represents the duty women have to support their sisters who do not enjoy their same freedoms and liberties; yet at the same time, it demonstrates the need to recognise that liberty and freedom may not look the same to each and every individual woman. It highlights the importance of a woman’s right to choose – whether that choice is to be a housewife, or to pursue a high-flying career, for instance. What’s important is members of society, especially other women – should not castigate, shame, or criticise another woman for pursuing what makes her happy. That’s an unequal application of standards and remains a barrier to women’s rights as it continues to trample and mute their individual voices. Each choice a woman makes is valid and equally important. Allow women to carve their own paths, and remember, girls support girls!”
Thank you to all our tutors for their thoughts on International Women’s Day’s 2020 slogan – a great one at that. In our view, two important changes must be made. Firstly, modern day feminism must be made more inter-sectional; secondly, people of all genders must be involved in conversations surrounding equality. In other words, each one of us must be included in, and interested in, conversations that work towards achieving equality for every woman. #EachforEqual encourages people everywhere, regardless of gender, to work together to address structural and local inequalities that continue to impede progress for women of every ethnicity, age, and class.
Written and edited by Katie Fretwell
Sussex Writes Blog 