Women's Day, which is traditionally celebrated internationally on 8 March, is dedicated to the struggles that have been waged by women for social, economic and political achievements and against the discrimination and violence they have suffered almost all over the world.

Standing, gentlemen, before a woman (from 'Quixote' by The Theatre of Hypatia)

 

On your feet, gentlemen, before a woman

On your feet,

standing, gentlemen, before a woman,

for all the violence perpetrated on her,

for the humiliation he suffered,

for that body of his which you exploited

for the intelligence you have trampled on

for the ignorance in which you have kept her

for that mouth you plugged

for her freedom that you denied her

for the wings you have clipped

for all this

standing, Gentlemen, standing before a Woman.

And if that's still not enough for you,

stand up every time she looks at your soul

because she can see it

because she can make it sing.

On your feet, always on your feet,

when she enters the room and everything resounds with love

when she caresses you with a tear,

as if you were his son!

When she keeps quiet

hides in its pain

his terrible desire to fly.

Do not try to console her

when everything collapses around her.

No, you just have to sit next to her,

and wait for his heart to stop beating

for the world to turn quietly again

and then you will see that she will be the first

to reach out a hand and lift you off the ground,

rising to the sky

towards that immense sky

to which his soul belongs

and from which you will never pluck it

for this standing

standing

in front of a woman.

 

(Anonymous)

Every year on 8 March we celebrate women: their rights, their achievements. The fight is still on for what is lacking in gender equality

Photo Gallery

    

 

Bibliography

Enough! The power of women against the politics of testosterone / Lilli Gruber. - Milan : Solferino, 2019.

Peace to all men of goodwill. But war on others. Because we have had enough. Chauvinist attacks on the web, fights, rapes, murders. The invisibility of women, excluded from decision-making roles. In a word: machismo in power. For too long we have been ruled by the international of testosterone: Trump, Putin, Xi Jinping, Bolsonaro, Erdogan, Johnson... Result: an unmanaged migratory emergency, an endless economic crisis, a planet in flames. And a climate of arrogance and hatred that fosters the spread of populism and undermines democratic institutions. So spare us more aspiring autocrats with more belly than substance and give us more girls. Feisty sportswomen like Milena Bartolini, determined activists like Greta Thunberg, influential politicians like Ursula von der Leyen and Christine Lagarde and, overseas, Nancy Pelosi. We will be satisfied when we have achieved the right goals: equal pay and a 50-50 split in boards of directors, parliaments, governments.

 

 

Dear Ijeawele : fifteen tips for raising a feminist child / Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie ; translation by Andrea Sirotti. - Turin : Einaudi, 2017.

Adichie has written an intense pamphlet in the form of a letter, with a confidential yet political outlook. 'Motherhood is a fantastic gift, but avoid defining yourself only in terms of motherhood. Be a complete person. In these first weeks as a new mother be kind to yourself. Ask for help. Demand help. There is no such thing as Superwoman. Never tell your daughter that she has to do something or that she should not do it "because you are a girl". "Because you are a girl" is never a good reason. Under no circumstances." What does it mean to be a feminist today? First, to reclaim one's importance, as an individual and as a woman together; to reclaim the right to equality without ifs and buts. And what does it mean to be a feminist mother? Not to stop being a woman, a professional, a person, and to share equal responsibility with one's partner. Showing a daughter the traps set by those who want to cage her by means of violence, physical or psychological, in a predefined role, and explaining to her that that role has no real value and that she can choose to be what she wants. Make her understand that her dignity does not depend on the gaze and judgement of others and that her fulfilment will not depend on pleasing that gaze.

 

Il catalogo delle donne valorose / Serena Dandini ; collages by Andrea Pistacchi. - Milan : Mondadori, 2018.

The protagonists of this book are thirty-four women, enterprising, against the tide, often persecuted, sometimes misunderstood but strong and generous, always ready to fight to achieve goals that seemed unattainable, if not unthinkable: from Ilaria Alpi, the journalist killed while investigating inconvenient truths, to Kathrine Switzer, the first woman to run the Boston Marathon; from Hypatia, who in the 4th century, against ecclesiastical bans, dared to peer into the heavens to reveal the movement of the planets, to Olympe de Gouges, author in 1791 of the revolutionary 'Declaration of the Rights of Women and Citizens', to Betty Boop who, despite being only a paper woman, still had to suffer censorship because of her exuberance. While waiting for official recognition, the author has placed alongside the protagonists of her book as many roses that far-sighted nurserymen have created for these valiant women. "This catalogue does not have the encyclopaedic pretension of doing justice to the collective amnesia that has deprived history of an essential part of its family tree, but only wants to give you a 'taste' of that submerged epic", Serena Dandini restores to readers the lives of formidable women, to nurture their memory and so that they can be an example for new generations.

 

The body of women / Lorella Zanardo. - Milan : Feltrinelli, 2010.

Italian women have been silent for years. Luckily not the author of 'The Body of Women'. She has rebelled against the dictatorship of the media by using for her documentary denunciation the same television images that offend women's dignity on a daily basis. "Why do Italian women continue to put up with a television that profoundly humiliates them?" asks Lorella Zanardo. "Why have women silently introjected the supposed male model of beauty and why do Italian women accept to work more than all European women? " Through the comments that readers of the blog ilcorpodelledonne.com send her, Lorella Zanardo realises that women's silence is only in the public sphere, while in the private sphere profound changes are taking place that society and politics are unable to recognise. Lorella Zanardo says: "If with the documentary I had proposed to work on women's awareness, to stimulate it and, if possible, to deepen it, starting from the damage caused by TV, the book also contemplates the proposal of a concrete method on how to educate the youngest to a critical vision of the media: 'New Eyes for TV' thus becomes a training path to change, immediately and concretely". More than a manifesto, more than the reconstruction of a season of struggle against television arrogance, 'The Women's Body' is first and foremost the story of a woman who finally said enough to the media abuse of the female body.

                         

Le disobbedienti : stories of six women who changed art / Elisabetta Rasy. - Milan : Mondadori, 2019.

What links Artemisia Gentileschi, raped at the age of eighteen by a friend of her father's and later a leading figure in seventeenth-century painting, to an icon of beauty and twentieth-century glamour like Frida Kahlo? What is the connection between Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, forced into exile by the French Revolution, and Charlotte Salomon, persecuted by the Nazis? Is there anything linking the elegant Berthe Morisot, to whom Édouard Manet devoted passionate portraits, to the transgressive Suzanne Valadon, the mistress of Toulouse-Lautrec and so many others in Belle Époque Paris? In spite of the diversity of historical period, environment and character, one essential trait unites these six female painters: talent above all, but also the strength of desire and the courage to rebel against the rules of the game imposed by society. Each of them, in fact, was able to arm themselves with a special quality of soul to counter their own fragility and the aggressions of life: ancient female resources, such as courage, tenacity, resistance, or vices transformed into virtues, such as restlessness, rebellion and passion. Elisabetta Rasy recounts, with tireless attention to the details of intimacy that draw a destiny, the lives of the six women painters in their irreducible singularity. The self-portraits that open Elisabetta Rasy's intense pages look into the eyes of the reader and invite them to discover the audacity with which they fought and won the hard battle to assert themselves - beyond prohibitions, obligations, misunderstandings and prejudices -, changing forever, with their work, the image and place of women in the art world.

 

Di testa loro : Dieci donne che hanno fatto il Novecento / Marta Boneschi. - Milan : A. Mondadori, 2002.

Neglected by great history, ten rebellious girls who, through joys and sorrows, successes and disappointments, managed to achieve their goal, come to life again in these pages. Maria Montessori and Rita Levi Montalcini stubbornly fought to enrol in medical school; Angela Merlin and Teresa Noce opposed fascism; Franca Valeri and Alida Valli made their way in show business. And again, Luisa Spagnoli creates an immortal chocolate with the Bacio, in an all-male entrepreneurial world; Armida Barelli organises millions of young Catholics; Lucia Bosé, when she sees her success fade is able to start again; Franca Viola takes her rapist to court.

 

 

Una donna / Sibilla Aleramo ; preface by Maria Corti. - Milan : Feltrinelli, 1994.

This novel by Sibilla Aleramo dates from 1906. Its immediate success in Italy and in the countries to which it was translated signalled a new writer, who would later provide other valuable evidence, notably in poetry. But above all it drew attention for its subject matter: it is in fact one of the first 'feminist' books to appear in Italy.

 

 

 The woman who lived for a dream / Maria Rosa Cutrufelli. - Piacenza : Frassinelli, 2004.

A champion of women's emancipation at the time of the French Revolution, Olympe de Gouges was the author of the famous 'Declaration of the Rights of Women and Citizens' and spent her life fighting to realise the dream of a society of free and equal individuals. The book traces her life, and fills in some historical gaps and mysteries through narrative invention. But Olympe's story is intertwined with the voices of the women who traverse the Revolution with her, in a tumultuous and exhausted Paris, the Paris of Robespierre and the Terror. Servants and commoners, aristocrats and artists, young girls inflamed for the tyrant and ambitious delinquents form a female chorus that narrates the beauty and horror of that time.

 

 

 Woman at war / Maraini Dacia. - Turin : Einaudi, c1980.

This is a novel in which Dacia Maraini has succeeded in depicting not only a woman's longing for redemption, but also the social tensions and revolts of young people. A return to a morally disintegrated Sicily, an encounter with a group of young extra-parliamentarians, the political and class struggle as a means of commitment to others and personal self-realisation.

 

 

 

 Women like us : 100 stories of Italian women who have done exceptional things. - Milan : Sperling & Kupfer, 2018.

We women need inspiration. And therefore a narrative of women's achievements and successes. We need 'women helping women'. Telling stories has never been more important. One hundred stories of contemporary women who by the strength of their tenacity, their competence and their courage have done something that is changing the world. Women who break down gender stereotypes with their choices and actions. Women who demonstrate in the field how belonging to this gender is an opportunity rather than a limitation. Strong and exciting stories that through conquests and successes inspire women to continue their revolution in the family, in the world of work, in society. Women's stories capable of pointing the way to a better future for all.

 

 

 Women take the stage : from suffragettes to feminists / Annie Goldman ; translation by David Scaffei. - Florence : Giunti, 1996.

Ours has been the century in which women have made decisive progress in all areas of public and private life. From the suffragettes at the beginning of the century to the feminist movement of the 1970s, the history of women's achievements is marked by a series of successes but also by problems that are still unresolved. Work, education, individual rights, legal equality, divorce, contraception, abortion: these are the items in a repertoire of achievements that have changed the male-female relationship. The diversity of the female and feminist outlook on the world has changed the way of looking at the many aspects of daily life and relations between the sexes. But the Western model, which remains a point of reference for the emancipation of women, also shows its limits: when will there be real equality in work, in politics? And what balance can be drawn from the condition of women in countries such as Tunisia, India, Iran, Algeria, where the persistence of centuries-old traditions does not cease to exert its heavy conditioning?

 

 Expectant women : Italy of gender inequalities / Alessandra Casarico and Paola Profeta. - Milan : Egea, 2010.

The gender gap between women and men in education has long since closed. Women now outnumber men in the number of university graduates. But women are still waiting: not so much for children (only a few are born), but to find room for employment, for professional growth, for power and decision-making roles in companies, in politics, in science. Why do women have to wait? Are there economic reasons to explain this delay? Keeping them out of employment and power has negative effects, which should be there for all to see: it is a waste of talent. More women in employment, smaller wage differentials, more women at the top and more equality in the family would have beneficial effects for the whole society. That is why we must stop seeing waiting as a women's problem. It is time for men to say enough too. What to do then? The authors make concrete proposals, suggesting some key policies to promote women's employment and careers and to unblock waiting.

 

Women in European history : from the Middle Ages to the present day / Gisela Bock ; translation by Benedetta Heinemann Campana. - Rome : Laterza, 2006.

One day, while Europa was playing with her friends on the seashore, Jupiter came swimming in the guise of a bull and abducted her. Representations of this myth show a frightened Europa sadly bidding farewell to her companions. Europa's descendants claimed peace and freedom. But were they able to be free? Gisela Bock, within the framework of a cultural history of gender relations, sketches the life, work and legal situation of women from the Middle Ages to the present day, their ideals and realities, their strenuous struggle for civil, political and social rights.

 

 

 Donne si diventa : anthology of feminist thought / edited by Eleonora Missana. - Milan : Feltrinelli, 2020.

The anthology is devoted to the theme of the relationship between feminism and philosophy in the contemporary age, presenting thinkers who, in different ways, identify themselves as feminists and/or postfeminists and who have produced works that have now become 'classics'. A fundamental problem acts as a common thread: the question of the 'subject' and the exploration of feminine and feminist subjectivity. The "situated" character of the anthology, divided into four sections, is revealed in the choice of starting with the presentation of the French and Italian thought of difference, from Luce Irigaray to Luisa Muraro and Adriana Cavarero, and then displacing it towards other ways of exploring sexual difference and feminist subjectivity, such as that of the so-called "postmodern" thinkers: from Bell Hooks to Gloria Anzaldúa, from Rosi Braidotti to Teresa de Lauretis and Judith Butler. The intention is to show a plurality of voices that are not always consonant with each other. In the third and fourth sections, the selected texts propose a more specifically political reflection on other issues, such as the relationship between science and feminism or women and biotechnology, as in the texts by Donna Haraway and Françoise Collin, and the theme of justice and the distribution of rights in the era of transnational capitalism, as in those by Nancy Fraser, Seyla Benhabib, Rada Ivekovic' and Gayatri Spivak.

 

The Women's genius : a brief history of female science / Piergiorgio Odifreddi. - Milan : Rizzoli, 2019.

The first is Hypatia, the astronomer and eclectic scholar in the learned Alexandria between the 4th and 5th centuries, then comes Hildegard, the visionary who intuited the importance of the body (a dangerously countercultural idea in the Middle Ages), Madame de Chatelet, Voltaire's companion, and Sophie Germain, Gauss's friend, both lovers of science and non-conformist women in the Age of Enlightenment. With masculine admiration, Odifreddi reconstructs the life paths, difficulties faced, strokes of genius, absolute dedication and freedom of thought of figures such as Rita Levi Montalcini and Maryam Mirzakhani (the first female Fields Medal winner), Marie Curie and the astronaut Judith Resnik, the unbeatable chess player Judit Polgár and the Chinese pharmacist Tu Youyou, Nobel Prize winner for Medicine. Reading this book is a journey into the versatility of the female mind, capable of reaching the highest peaks in all disciplines while advancing the path of humanity. At the same time, it can serve as a spur to today's girls to finally enter scientific studies without an unjustified sense of inadequacy.

 

Giovinette : the female footballers who challenged the Duce / Federica Seneghini ; with an essay by Marco Giani. - Milan : Solferino, 2020.

Rosetta, with her sixteen years and the sacred fire of football in her soul. Giovanna, for whom the team's adventure is also a political gesture. Marta, wise and poised but determined to fight for the freedom to play. And then the courageous Zanetti who kicks off the game, the strategist Strigaro who writes to the newspapers, the stubborn Lucchi who struggles to overcome her father's opposition... These are the friends who, at the beginning of the 1930s, set up the Milanese women's football team, the first women's football team in Italy. But Italy at the time was fascist and as the group expanded, became a real formation and began to make headlines in the newspapers, the regime became alarmed. Of course, these young girls have given themselves shorter playing times and lighter rules, making sure they do not want to compromise their 'primary function' as mothers. They take the field in knee socks and a black skirt so as not to offend morals. But they are still women and football is a boy's sport. Not to mention the fact that Giovanna's husband Giuseppe gets into trouble with the political police. Federica Seneghini tells the story of the friendship, play and struggle of these football pioneers like a novel, amidst exhilarating victories, humiliating setbacks, unexpected allies and implacable enemies. Carefully reconstructed and accompanied by an essay by Marco Giani, who traces decades of female discrimination in the world of football, this compelling glimpse into our past is also a valuable reflection on the injustices still dangerously alive in our present.

 

The great war of women : roses in no man's land / Alessandro Gualtieri. - Fidenza : Mattioli 1885, 2012.

A female world at war, women involved and thrown into the social conflict generated far from the actual trenches, but still on the front line, in that great field of battle and pain that was the 'home front'. A research that starts from the mortifying 19th-century consideration of women, evaluated as slaves, broodmothers, objects of pleasure for payment, like perishable and expendable consumer goods, irrelevant to the socio-political changes of nations, albeit evolved in post-Risorgimento Europe. The Great War contributed greatly to the revaluation of women, a world conflict that involved continents and their populations, in the widest sense of the term. Like a stone, the Great War shattered behaviour patterns and relations between genders and age groups, as well as between the various social classes, calling into question hierarchies, distinctions and authorities that were considered immutable: an effect that, contained for the moment by repressive legislation, would emerge more widely in the post-war period, contributing to giving social struggles, including those for women's rights, that imprint of radical upheaval of the existing order that would change the world forever.

 

Invisibles : how our world ignores women in every field. Data at hand / Caroline Criado Perez ; translation by Carla Palmieri. - Turin : Einaudi, 2020.

In a society built in the image and likeness of men, half the population, women, are systematically ignored. Witness the shocking absence of available data on female bodies, habits and needs. As in the case of smartphones, developed based on the size of men's hands; or the average office temperature, calibrated to the male metabolism; or medical research, which excludes women from tests 'for the sake of simplification'. Starting from these startling cases and examining many others, Caroline Criado Perez creates an unprecedented investigation that shows us how the gender data vacuum has created a pervasive and latent prejudice that has a profound, sometimes even fatal, reverberation on women's lives.

 

 

 The book of feminism. - Milan : Gribaudo, 2019.

If you are a feminist, or if you simply want to learn more about the concept, expanding your knowledge of the development of feminism over the centuries and in different places, you will find plenty of food for thought! Is one born a woman or does one become one? Can a man be authentically feminist? What demands does feminism make in the 21st century? The book answers these and other questions, exploring the struggle for gender equality through the centuries. Written in a simple and straightforward manner, "The Book of Feminism" includes theories, memorable quotes, anecdotes, and images that shed new light on our perceptions and ideas related to feminism. In addition, the pages explain how the concept of feminism itself has changed the course of history for women and men, from its roots, through the Enlightenment, to the present day and the #meToo phenomenon.

 

 Morgana : stories of girls your mother wouldn't approve of / Michela Murgia, Chiara Tagliaferri. - Milan : Mondadori, 2019.

It is a feminine story that sets no limits because the very aim of the book is to abolish them. The female figures recounted here are extraordinary women who have shifted the boundaries of accessibility that had previously been set by the male world. Every time a Marina Abramovic has been recognised or has taken a step, a Morgana, or rather the powerful and dangerous sister of the famous King Arthur, makes her way into society and represents all women, allowing their gaze to finally go beyond, waiting until there is no longer any need to tell these stories. Murgia and Tagliaferri, however, go further, spying on women through a feminine magnifying glass because often, among them, they are considered dangerous witches, who attack something strong and predetermined. The Ginger Rogers syndrome, that idea that women are better no matter what and therefore can share a stage with men, but standing on vertiginous stiletto heels, is ripped to shreds by Murgia and Tagliaferri. 'Morgana' is in fact a celebration of strength and diversity, of a package of emotions and skills that always push the reader further.

 

Pride and prejudice / Tiziana Ferrario. - Milan : Chiarelettere, 2018.

This book begins one morning in Washington, 21 January 2017, the day of the historic march of one million women against President Trump, and travels live across the United States to Italy. A journey full of encounters and exciting, often difficult stories, many of them unknown. An intense tale, which captures page after page always keeping the focus on the facts and on what remains to be done to achieve real equality. Women have once again raised their voices demanding equal career opportunities, equal pay and rights. From sports champions to the most brilliant scientists, from Hollywood actresses to the many ordinary women who are preparing to enter politics in search of revenge. From courses for girls on self-esteem to experiences in colleges, where they are trying to curb the drama of rape. And again female journalists from the world's leading newsrooms who have faced exceptional challenges head-on. You will read stories of famous women such as Megyn Kelly, Fox News and Nbc TV star, who dared to challenge Trump on live TV, and stories of unknown, but equally powerful women, such as the Italian bookseller who promotes the diffusion of science books to girls (because science and mathematics are not the prerogative of males, on the contrary). Always with the focus on our country, where so much has been done but so much remains to be done for a more equal society.

 

La passione e la fatica : organisational and inner obstacles to women's careers / Maria Cristina Bombelli. - Milan : Baldini Castoldi Dalai, 2004.

The conquest of roles of responsibility and autonomy in the professional sphere has significantly changed women's approach to the world of work, profoundly affecting female identity. The woman who today attempts to climb the ladder to positions of power is very different, but at the same time linked to caring responsibilities, which have always been a woman's prerogative. Women who could access positions of power describe more intense and different labours from those of men. The author tries to distinguish those of an organisational nature from those related to skills that women have yet to mature. For passion to overcome fatigue, in fact, women must learn to choose the organisations in which to lend their talents.

 

When all the women in the world... / Simone de Beauvoir ; edited by Claude Francis and Fernande Gontier. - Turin : Einaudi, 2006.

Family, contraception, love, abortion, violence: through articles, interviews, notes, Simone de Beauvoir addresses the condition of women without reticence and invites men and women to consider true equality of the sexes a necessary conquest for the progress of society. Published in Italy in 1982, the militant pages of this book retain an extraordinary and burning topicality, especially today when certain civil rights, achieved thanks to the struggles of the feminist movement, are being questioned by certain political and confessional circles.

 

Portrait / Joyce Lussu ; foreword by Giulia Ingrao. - Rome : L'asino d'oro, 2012.

The ironic and unscrupulous autobiography of an irreducible woman. From Florence in the 1920s to Jaspers' Heidelberg, from the underground to the anti-fascist war, from meeting the great patriot Emilio Lussu to travelling in search of poets to translate, from Giustizia e Libertà to '68, from feminist struggles to those of the Kurdish people and finally to environmentalist struggles. The story of a woman who did not want to be considered special, but anticipated all times. The story of a woman who, with simple, sincere, often strong and disarming words, makes us reflect on public and private issues, on war, politics, religion, on important and profound realities such as the man-woman relationship and the parent-child relationship. The story of 'a woman for', or rather 'constructive, generous, capable of seeing the positive side and possibilities of life', as Giulia Ingrao writes in her preface.

 

Holy patience : the history of Italian women from the post-war period to today / Marta Boneschi. - Milan : A. Mondadori, c1998.

Through the testimonies of well-known and lesser-known women, the analysis of news events and the contributions that radio, television, advertising, photostories and magazines have made to the shaping of female identity, Marta Boneschi tells us how the world has changed more rapidly for women than for men, making us relive the least bloody and most successful revolution of our century.

 

 

The century of women : Italy in the twentieth century in the feminine / Elena Doni, Manuela Fugenzi. - Rome ; Bari : Laterza, 2001.

Was the 20th century really 'the century of women'? One doubts it when one thinks that in the year 2000, gender equality in work and home care is far from being achieved. In the twentieth century, however, women have developed a different self-conception: today they no longer think of themselves as complementary or second to men. And they have won the freedom to choose their lives in work, marriage and, for the first time in history, motherhood. The story and images of Italian women in the last century.

 

 

 If you are born a woman / Oriana Fallaci . - Milan : Rizzoli, 2019.

Oriana Fallaci's career is studded with encounters with the female figures of her time, starting with the first news articles commissioned by 'Europeo'. The journalist met models, singers, actresses from Cinecittà and Hollywood stars, but also fashion personalities such as Coco Chanel or Mary Quant, who became icons for generations to come. In the roaring years of feminist protest, she interviewed the protagonists of the movement such as Kate Millett, observing as an attentive witness the epoch-making changes that would mark Italy, one above all the referendum on divorce. In the 1970s, the period in which she collects her interviews with the powerful of the Earth, she will manage to meet Golda Meir and Indira Gandhi, tracing the portrait not only of two exceptional political personalities, but also of two unique female profiles. Oriana Fallaci observes and describes a 20th century in which the role and condition of women, particularly in the western world, changed considerably. She herself, on the other hand, embodied the ideals of a concrete feminism in her life: in the profound freedom of being able to be what she wanted she believed in until the end of her days. This book brings together a selection of pages dedicated by the Florentine journalist to the female universe: interviews, investigations, portraits never before collected in a volume. Pages from which her sharp judgement and her particular vision of women shine through: creatures who should always and necessarily be free.

 

If not now when? against violence and for the dignity of women / edited by Eve Ensler with Mollie Doyle; translated by Annalisa Carena. - Milan : Piemme, 2012.

In our parts it is insidious, creeping, hidden. Even glamorous. In some parts of the world, however, it is blatant and brutal. So daily that it seems inescapable. It is violence against women. It is the war on female dignity. Tentacular and multiform. Women victims of political rape, kidnapped and beaten because they are weak pawns on the chessboard of tribal conflicts. Wives who suffer in silence within the walls of their homes. Daughters who see their mothers remain silent for years in the face of absurd religious impositions. Eve Ensler, champion of women's rights, leads a chorus of passionate and authoritative voices that becomes a cry for freedom. To say that being a woman today is still not easy, because there is a tendency to deny that violence, in its many forms, exists. These stories, touching, angry, emotional and at times light and poetic, remind us that women's dignity is an asset that must be protected and defended by all. To make the world a better place.

 

Be beautiful and shut up : why today's Italy offends women / Michela Marzano. - Milan : Oscar Mondadori, 2012.

"This book is an act of resistance. Faced with the insults and humiliations that women in Italy suffer today, as a philosopher, I felt it my duty to abandon the ivory tower in which intellectuals often entrench themselves in order to explain the dynamics of oppression that imprison Italian women. The aim is simple: to give all those who wish to do so the critical tools they need to reject subservience to male power. Why do women continue to give in to the temptation of guilt and, for fear of being considered 'unworthy mothers', abandon all professional aspirations? Why are so many women judged 'failed' or 'incomplete' when they do not have children? Why do many teenage girls think that the only way to succeed in life is to 'be beautiful and keep quiet'? Why does the woman's body continue to be commodified? Why are we witnessing the return of a retrograde ideology that would like to turn back the clock and question the female achievements of the 1960s and 1970s? Philosophy is an effective and powerful weapon, the only tool capable of helping women regain possession of their lives and no longer allow anyone to humiliate or silence them." Michela Marzano

 

A room of one's own / Virginia Woolf ; translation and preface by Maura Del Serra. - Rome : Newton Compton Publishers, 2013.

The illustrious progenitor of twentieth-century women's manifestos and Woolf's first brilliant intervention on the subject of "women and writing", this writing is a small, ironically imaginative treatise, highly personal in the tense measure of tones and motifs: the "conversational", literary projections, social analysis, satire. The leitmotif of the room, womb and prison of the female soul, broadens to encompass all the places of the human dwelling: nature, culture, history and 'reality' itself in its disturbing and exhilarating multiplicity. Introduction by Armanda Guiducci.

 

 

 On women's rights / Mary Wollstonecraft ; foreword by Eva Cantarella. - Milan : RCS newspapers, 2010.

"Following long reflections on history and after diligently taking note of the reality around us, I found myself sad and indignant. Indeed, in spite of myself, I had to admit that the differences between human beings were not established by nature, but by civilisation itself. After reading many books on pedagogy, I observed the behaviour of parents and the school system. What did I deduce from all this? I have convinced myself that inadequate education is the primary cause of the deficiencies I regret...'. In 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft shocked the British community with a surprising and groundbreaking work. On Women's Rights examines with an objective and critical eye the position of women in society, bringing to light the causes, consequences and injustices of dogmas and prejudices considered correct only out of habit or convenience, pointing the finger at her own sisters who accepted their lot willingly rather than rebelling. A valuable historical document, one of the first works that laid a solid foundation for the fight for women's rights.

 

 

Sardinia Bibliography

 

Words ahead : feminism in the third millennium / Claudia Sarritzu. - Cagliari : Palabanda, 2018.

It is an essay on gender discrimination and violence as observed by those who report in Italy. It analyses the words of the media and those of our everyday life. It explains the need for a new feminism. From the Sardinian woman to the Syrian woman, from Italian machismo to Brazilian machismo.

 

 

 

 Sardinia al femminile : stories of special women. - Cagliari : Società Editrice L'Unione Sarda, 2016.             

The book covers the time span of a millennium: from the Middle Ages of the giudicessa Elena di Lacon to the present day with the memory of the identity scholar Nereide Rudas. There is no shortage of historical trivia on Sardinia's first female medical graduate, Paola Satta, as well as an entirely new profile of Grazia Deledda. World stars of show business such as Carmen Melis and Giusta Manca di Villahermosa are not overlooked, nor are energetic figures of faith such as the first Sardinian blessed Maria Gabriella Sagheddu and the anti-Nazi nun Giuseppina Demuro. The numerous and well-documented forays into Sardinian history make the book a valuable teaching aid for our schools, for the purpose of a better and greater historical-identity awareness of our land's autonomous journey for our children.

 

 

The extraordinary story of Francesca Sanna Sulis woman of Sardinia / Ada Lai. - Cagliari : Palabanda, 2017.

The unbelievable story of Francesca Sanna Sulis (1716-1810), who in the 18th century, starting from Muravera, became an entrepreneur and fashion designer of European fame. Her intuition to breed silkworms was the beginning of her fortune: the silk produced in her Quartucciu workshops became the most prized and in demand in all international markets. She started vocational and low schools to enable the poorest to get an education; she dealt personally with the powerful minister Bogino; she became a business partner of Count Giulini; she witnessed the expulsion of the Piedmontese from Cagliari in 1794. A woman who managed to combine business with solidarity and the emancipation of women.

 

 

 

Bibliography for children

 The declaration of women's rights / Elisabeth Brami, Estelle Billon-Spagnol. - Milan : Lo stampatello, 2015.

Little girls, like little boys, have the right to be dishevelled, flayed, shaken and to choose the job they prefer. The right to be good at maths, not to be princesses. In a society where the market proposes rigid gender models and where for every game and every outfit there is a male and a female version, we want to remind you that you can be male and female in a thousand ways. All to be respected.

 

 

 

 Malala : my battle for girls' rights / Malala Yousafzai ; with Patricia McCormick ; illustrations by Joanie Stone ; translation by Sara Caraffini. - Milan : Garzanti, 2018.

The youngest Nobel Peace Prize winner tells her story as an activist for the right to education. In a new version for younger readers. Before becoming a world-famous activist, Malala was just a girl ready to fight for everything she believed in. But in what was once a peaceful valley in Pakistan, girls are suddenly banned from attending school, and Malala puts her life on the line to defend her right to an education. In this new abridged version of her memoir, embellished with illustrations, a glossary and a timeline, we follow the extraordinary story of a girl who refused to be silenced and who today shares with her readers the importance of taking a stand against hatred, offering a message full of determination and hope. Reading age: 6 years and up.

 

I'm not a feminist, but... : everything you need to know about women's struggles / Sophie Grillet ; translation by Carola Proto. - Milan : A. Mondadori, 1999.

Reading this book means putting aside folklore and clichés to find out everything you ever wanted to know about the battles, hopes, stubbornness, dreams, and courage of thousands of women who over the centuries fought for themselves, for their rights.

 

 

 

Equality in small steps / Carina Louart ; illustrations by Penelope Paicheler ; translation and adaptation by Stefania Baldoni. - Florence ; Milan : Giunti, 2017.

The status of men and women is not always equal. In Italy, women were only granted the right to vote in 1945 and in some parts of the world women still have to ask their husbands for permission to work. For some time, various voices have been raised to demand the same rights for men and women: thus the idea of equality was born.

 

 

Bedtime stories for rebellious girls : 100 lives of extraordinary women / Elena Favilli and Francesca Cavallo ; translation by Loredana Baldinucci. - Milan : Mondadori, 2017.

Once upon a time... a princess? No way! There was once a little girl who wanted to go to Mars. There was another who became the strongest tennis player in the world and yet another who discovered the metamorphosis of butterflies. From Serena Williams to Malala Yousafzai, from Rita Levi Montalcini to Frida Kahlo, from Margherita Hack to Michelle Obama, there are 100 women recounted in these pages and portrayed by 60 illustrators from all over the world. Scientists, painters, astronauts, weightlifters, musicians, judges, chefs... examples of courage, determination and generosity for anyone who wants to realise their dreams.

 

 

Bedtime stories for rebellious girls 2 / Francesca Cavallo, Elena Favilli ; translation by Loredana Baldinucci and Simona Brogli. - Milan : Mondadori, 2018.

Once upon a time there were a hundred girls who changed the world. Now there are many, many more! "Bedtime stories for rebellious little girls" has become a global movement and a symbol of freedom. Authors Francesca Cavallo and Elena Favilli are back with one hundred new stories to inspire little girls - and boys - to dream without boundaries: Audrey Hepburn, who ate tulips to survive hunger and went on to become an unparalleled style icon and an extraordinary philanthropist; Bebe Vio, a feisty fencing champion despite a serious illness; J.K. Rowling, who turned failure into a strength and changed the history of literature forever. Poets, surgeons, astronauts, judges, acrobats, businesswomen, volcanologists: one hundred new adventures, one hundred new portraits to inspire us again and tell us that at every age, age and latitude, it is always worth fighting for equality and moving forward at a fast pace towards a fairer future.

 

Comics

 

Bad girls : 15 stories of bold and creative women / Assia Petricelli and Sergio Riccardi. - Rome : Sinnos, 2017.

15 stories of daring, creative, courageous, revolutionary women return in a new graphic and typographical layout in colour, essential and disruptive. From Olympe de Gouges to Nellie Bly, from Marie Curie to Hedy Lamarr, fifteen well-known and lesser-known stories, told with passion and militancy. Reading age: from 12 years.

 

 

 

 Women without fear : 150 years of struggles for women's emancipation as they have never been told / Marta Breen, Jenny Jordahl. - Milan : Tre60, 2019.

In every part of the world, women have fought and still fight for their emancipation and rights. This book tells the story we should all know. It is the journey that our mothers, grandmothers and great-grandmothers took to get to this day. Women Without Fear is an illustrated account of this journey, as seen through the lives of some of the iconic women: from the anti-slavery Sojourner Truth to Olympe de Gouges, who wrote the Declaration of the Rights of Women and Citizens, from Margaret Sanger, who created the first women's clinic, to Malala, who won the Nobel Peace Prize, and the many women of the #MeToo movement.

 

Filmography (DVD)

  The right to count : based on a true story never told / director of photography Mandy Walker ; screenplay by Allison Schroeder and Theodore Melfi ; directed by Theodore Melfi. - Milan : Warner Bros. Entertainment Italia, 2017.

The Right to Count is the incredible, never-before-told story of Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughn and Mary Jackson, three brilliant African-American women who, at NASA, worked on one of the greatest operations in history: astronaut John Glenn's expedition into orbit, a major goal that not only brought confidence back to the nation, but turned the Space Race upside down, galvanising the entire world. The three pioneers - overcoming all barriers - have been a model of inspiration for generations.

 

 

Frida / a film by Julie Taymor ; with Selma Hayek ...et al. ; director of photography Rodrigo Prieto ; music by Elliot Goldenthal ; inspired by the book by Hayden Herrera. - Milan : Eagle pictures, 2011.

Frida Kahlo is the artist who more than any other managed to construct a powerful autobiography in images, capable of telling her story with intensity: physical pain, the drama of betrayed love and abortions, political commitment. But who was Frida really? Actress and director Asia Argento leads the viewer to discover the two faces of the painter, following letters, diaries and private confessions.

 

 

The Help / based on Kathryn Stockett's best seller ; music by Thomas Newman ; director of photography Stephen Goldblatt ; adapted to the screen and directed by Tate Taylor. - Milan : DreamWorks II Distribution, 2012.

Mississippi, 1960s. Eugenia 'Skeeter' Phelan, a girl from Jackson, southern part of the state, dreams of becoming a writer after finishing school. When she starts writing a column for a local newspaper about advice for housewives, she turns to Aibileen, her best friend's maid, who begins to tell her the moving story of her life. Skeeter, encouraged by a New York publisher, thus becomes involved in writing a secret project that chronicles the racial discrimination faced by black women who have always cared for families in the area.

 

 

Malala / a film by Davis Guggenheim ; music by Thomas Newman ; director of photography Erich Roland. - Italy : Twentieth Century Fox, 2016.

An intimate and personal portrait of Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, who became a target of the Taliban and was severely injured by a barrage of bullets during a school bus ride home in Pakistan's Swat Valley. She was then 15 years old (she turned 18 in 2015) and had been targeted, along with her father, for her fight for women's education, and the attack on her caused outrage and protests from supporters from all over the world. Miraculously surviving, she now leads a global campaign for the right to education for girls and children around the world, as co-founder of the Malala Fund.

 

 

Mulan / directed by Barry Cook and Tony Bancroft ; produced by Pam Coats. - Walt Disney Home Entertainment ; Milan : Buena vista home entertainment distributor, 2004.

Young Mulan, after discovering that her elderly father has been called upon to defend China from the invading Huns, disguises herself as a man to take her father's place in the imperial army. Here she is trained together with a group of warriors led by Captain Shang. Together with the little dragon Mushu and the lucky cricket Cri-Kee she will bring victory to her nation and honour to her family.

 

 

Persepolis / a film by Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud ; with the voices of Sergio Castellitto, Paola Cortellesi, Licia Maglietta ; Satrapi ; BIM : 01 Distribution, c2008.

In 'Persepolis', the author's private history is mixed with the history of a country, Iran. In 1984, when she was only fifteen years old, Marjane Satrapi was forced to leave Tehran, where she lived with her parents, because at that time life for a teenager was impossible. She went to Austria, where she experienced the alienation of a different culture and the feeling of uprooting that always accompanies every exile. Then she went to Paris, studied and grew up. And at a certain point she felt the need to tell her story by picking up some sheets of paper and a pencil. The book traces the stages that led from the comic strip to the film, with interviews with the author, director and illustrators, and documents the reception the film has had in Iran and the West through articles and reviews.

 

  Suffragette : the women who changed the world / directed by Sarah Gavron ; music Alexandre Desplat ; director of photography Edu Grau ; written by Abi Morgan. - Rome : Rai Cinema ; 01 Distribution, 2016.

The story of the militants of the very first feminist movement, women forced to act clandestinely to conduct a dangerous cat-and-mouse game with an increasingly brutal state. Fighting for the right to vote, these women belong to the educated and wealthy classes and some of them work, but they are all forced to realise that peaceful protest does not bring any results. Radicalising their methods and resorting to violence as the only path to change, these women are prepared to lose everything in their battle for equality: their jobs, their families, their children and their lives. At one time, Maud was also one of these militants. The story of her struggle for dignity is both poignant and inspiring.

 

 

We want sex equality : the strike that changed history / a film by Nigel Cole ; screenplay by William Ivory ; music by David Arnold. - Rome : Lucky Red, 2010.

Dagenham, England, 1968. Under the leadership of the loquacious and belligerent Rita O'Grady, 187 Ford sewing machine workers decide to go on strike to protest against the unsustainable working conditions, and the long hours stolen from the balance of domestic life. With irony, common sense and courage, the workers managed to make themselves heard by the trade unions, the local community and finally, thanks to MP Barbara Castle's battle, also by the government to lay the foundations of the 'Equal Pay Act'.

 

 

All the books, comics and DVDs listed (and much more material on the subject) are available in our libraries. 

  

Sitography

 

 

Videography

 

Objective No. 5 - Gender Equality

 

International Women's Day: how the 8 March holiday came about

 

La bella Politica - The achievements of women that changed Italy

 

Women's Day: 10 women who made history with their courage

 

Women who changed history

 

8 March: a day for women's rights

 

Beauty is... Women's Rights in the World - ActionAid

 

Will women ever win the race for equality in sport?