Women's history month 2018: of arts and politics

Abstract

March 8 is globally the International Women’s Day; in some countries it is noted, even celebrated, but it is not a civic holiday in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, unlike the post-Soviet countries of Eurasia where it is a national holiday. In Canada, it corresponds to the celebration of Persons Day on October 18 since 1929. The month of March is the “annual declared” Women’s History Month in the United States, following February as the Black History Month3. Preceded by a decade of Women’s History Weeks, since 1988 the celebration of Women in History in America is accompanied by a Presidential Proclamation and has its own website4. The Wikipedia article, last updated on March 30, 2018, notes that “The Women's Progress Commission will soon conduct hearings to promote interest in preserving areas that are relevant in American women's history.” If 2018 marks a 40-year mark of such highlighting of women’s contributions to history and contemporary society, it has been 55 years since the 1963 federal report produced by the Commission on the Status of Women. That was the first comprehensive federal report on women, and it took until March 2011 for it to be followed by another when the Obama administration released a report on Women in America: Indicators of Social and Economic Well-Being.