Subjects of this project

Include Suffragettes, and are claimants of entitlements and freedoms for women (including girls) in any or all societies.

In some places women's rights are institutionalized or supported by law, local custom, and behavior, whereas in others they may be ignored or suppressed. They differ from broader notions of human rights through claims of an inherent historical and traditional bias against the exercise of rights by women in favor of men (paternalism).

Issues commonly associated with notions of women's rights / feminism (very similar, though not entirely equivalent terms) include, though are not limited to, rights to: bodily integrity and autonomy, to vote (suffrage), to hold public office, to work, to fair wages or equal pay, to own property, to education, to serve in the military or be conscripted, to enter into legal contracts and to have marital, parental and religious rights.

Persons whose profiles collected here are or were involved in establishing or defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Advocates of women's rights / feminism seek to liberate men as well as women. The subjects of this project can be persons of either sex.

Advocates of women's rights / feminism have opposed domestic violence, sexual harassment, and sexual assault. In economics, they have advocated for workplace rights, including equal pay and opportunities for careers and to start businesses.

The movements and theoretical developments in the advocacy of women's rights / feminism were historically led predominantly by middle-class white women from Western Europe and North America, but are increasingly apparent throughout the world.

Outline of Women's Rights

adapted from Wikipedia's [2010] article concerning women's rights

1 History

a. Ancient civilizations
b. Early reforms under Islam
c. The Middle Ages (e.g., English writers Jane Anger, Aemilia Lanyer; the prophetess Anna Trapnell)
d. The Enlightenment (e.g., Mary Wollstonecraft, a British writer and philosopher)
e. The 19th Century

2 Suffrage, the right to vote (See the "List of suffragists and suffragettes" below)

3 Modern movement

4 The United Nations and women's rights

5 International and regional law

6 Reproductive rights

7 Abortion

8 Rape and sexual violence

9 Property rights

List of notable women's rights advocates

adapted from Wikipedia's [2010] list

NOTE: Bold names indicate profiles currently in the project. More profiles will be added as profiles are created or found.

A

• Bella Abzug (Savitsky) (1920 – 1998) - American lawyer and Congresswoman (1971-77), who joined Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, and others to found the National Women's Political Caucus.
• Abigail Adams (Smith) (1744 – 1818) - First Lady of the United States, wife of John Adams, second President
• Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa (1486 – 1535) - German theologian and occult writer, and author of Declamation on the Nobility and Preeminence of the Female Sex
• Qasim Amin (1863 – 1908) - Egyptian jurist, early advocate of women’s rights in Egyptian society
• Carolina Beatriz Ângelo (1878 – 1911) - Portuguese doctor, founder of the Republican Portuguese Women's League, the first woman to vote in Portugal
• Jane Anger - author of Her Protection for Women, London: Printed by Richard Jones, and Thomas Orwin. 1589
• Parvin Ardalan (born 1967) - Iranian women's rights activist
• Bibi Khanoom Astarabadi (1859 – 1921) - Iranian writer

B

• Jane Bartram (c.1734-c.1815) ; example of a Colonial PA woman who attempted to gain rights to divorce and property rights
• Anne Bradstreet (c.1611 – 1672) - first American female poet
• Susan Brownmiller (born 1935) - American author of Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape (1975)
• Ansar Burney (born 1956) - Pakistani women's rights activist
• Lucy Burns (1879 – 1966) - American suffragist and women's rights activist
• Josephine Butler (1828 – 1906) - British social reformer

C

• Luisa Capetillo (1879 – 1922) - Puerto Rican labor union suffragette; jailed for wearing pants in public
• Shirley Chisholm (St. Hill) (1924 – 2005) - American Congresswoman (1969-83), the first African-American woman elected to Congress
• Hillary Clinton (Rodham) - former First Lady, former Secretary of State. Perhaps she will be the first woman to be elected President of the United States of America.
• Marguerite Coppin (1867 – 1931) - poet laureate of Belgium and advocate of women's rights
• Minnie Fisher Cunningham (1882 – 1964) - first president of League of Women Voters, First woman from Texas to run for the United States Senate

D

• Unity Dow (born 1959) - judge and writer from Botswana, plaintiff in a case that allowed children of Motswana women and foreign men to be considered Batswana.
• Sediqeh Dowlatabadi (1882 – 1962) - Iranian journalist and women's rights activist
• Andrea Dworkin (1946 – 2005) - American writer known for her criticism of pornography (born in NJ to parents, Harry Dworkin and Sylvia Spiegel)

E

• Shirin Ebadi (born 1947) - awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her efforts for the rights of women and children.
• Carolyn Egan (birthdate unknown) - Canadian-American trade unionist and feminist, advocate for women’s reproductive rights, including access to birth control, abortion, and sex education
• Mohtaram Eskandari (1895 – 1924) - Iranian woman's rights activist, founder of "Jam'iat e nesvan e vatan-khah" (Society of Patriotic Women)

F

• Susan Faludi (born 1959) - American journalist, author of Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women (1991)
• Betty Friedan (born Bettye Naomi Goldstein) (1921 – 2006) - American author of feminist books including The Feminine Mystique (1963), and founder of the National Organization for Women (1966)
• Margaret Fuller (1810 – 1850) - Transcendentalist, critic, advocate for women's education, author of Woman in the Nineteenth Century

G

• Engy Ghozlan (born 1985) - Coordinator of campaigns against sexual harassment in Egypt
• Emma Goldman (1869 – 1940) - American anarchist and women's rights advocate
• Germaine Greer (born 1939) - Australian academic, and author of The Female Eunuch (1970), Sex and Destiny: The Politics of Human Fertility (1984); The Change: Women, Ageing and the Menopause (1991); The Whole Woman (1999), and Shakespeare's Wife (2007)

H

• Marianne Hainisch (1839 – 1936) - Austrian activist, proponent of women’s right to work and to receive education
• bell hooks (intentionally uncapitalized), pen name of Gloria Jean Watkins (born 1952) - American author of Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (1984), Ain’t I a Woman?: Black Women and Feminism (1992), All About Love: New Visions (2000), and We Real Cool: Black Men and Masculinity (2004). (Her parents were Veodis Watkins and Rosa Watkins (Bell))

I

J

• Helen Joseph (1905 - 1992) - Appalled by the plight of black women In South Africa, Helen Joseph was pivotal in the formation of the Federation of South African Women and with the organisation's leadership, spearheaded a march of 20,000 women to the Union Buildings in Pretoria to protest against pass laws on August 9, 1956. August 9th is celebrated in South Africa as "Women's Day."

K

• Sheema Kalbasi (born 1972) - Iranian writer and advocate for human rights and gender equality
• Raden Adjeng Kartini (1879 – 1904) - Javanese advocate for native Indonesian women, critic of polygamous marriages and lack of education opportunities for women
• Begum Ramayana Liaquat Ali Khan (1905 – 1990) - Indian-Pakistani activist, founder of the All Pakistan Women’s Association, organizer of women’s nursing and first aid corps to help refugees in Delhi despite public resistance to women working outside the home
• Noushin Ahmadi Khorasani (born 1970) - Iranian women's rights activist
• Coretta King (Scott) (1927 – 2006) - American author, activist, and civil rights leader. The widow of Martin Luther King, Jr., Coretta Scott King helped lead the African-American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. After her husband's 1968 assassination, she took on leadership of the struggle for racial equality, became active in the Women's Movement and the LGBT rights movement.

L

• Audre Lorde (1934 -1 992)
• Sara Jane Lippincott (Clarke), her pen name "Grace Greenwood" (1823 – 1904) - first woman reporter on the New York Times payroll, advocate for social reform and women's rights

M

• Kate Millett (born 1934) - American author of the book Sexual Politics (1970)
• Laure Moghaizel (1929 – 1997) - Lebanese lawyer and women's rights advocate
• Rahima Moosa (1922-1933) - Anti-apartheid activist in South Africa. While heavily pregnant, Rahima Moosa was a key figure in the Women’s March against pass laws in South Africa on August 9, 1956. This day is celebrated in South Africa as Women's Day.

N

• Diane Nash (born 1938) - American activist in civil and women's rights movements
• Lilian Masediba Ngoyi (1911-1980) - Anti-apartheid activist who led a march of 20,000 women to the Union Buildings in Pretoria to protest against pass laws on August 9, 1956. This day is celebrated in South Africa as Women's Day.
• Roshank No'doost (1899 – ?) - Iranian woman's rights activist, founder of Peyk-e Saadat-e Nesvan Society.

O

• Sophie D. Ogutu (born 1976) - World March of Women Kenya, coordinator 5Cs Human Rights Theatre Group, Kenya.
• Yoko Ono (born 1933) - Japanese-American artist, filmmaker, and musician who wrote the feminist songs Woman is the Nigger of the World and Woman
• Ana de Castro Osório (1872 – 1935) - Portuguese writer, journalist, republican and feminist activist who wrote the first portuguese feminist manifest "As Mulheres Portuguesas".

P

• Emmeline Pankhurst (1858 – 1928) - one of the founders of the British suffragette movement
• Rosa Parks (McCauley) (1913 – 2005) - African-American civil rights activist. On December 1, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks refused to obey the command of the driver of a public bus to give up her seat to make room for a white passenger. The U.S. Congress later called Rosa Parks "the first lady of civil rights," and "the mother of the freedom movement."
• Alice Paul (1885 – 1977) - American suffragist and women's rights activist
• Jyotiba Phule (1827 – 1890) - Indian social reformer, critic of the caste system, founded a school for girls, a widow-remarriage initiative, a home for upper caste widows, and a home for infant girls to discourage female infanticide
• Katha Pollitt (born 1949) - author of Reasonable Creatures (1995)
• Griselda Pollock (born 1949) - art historian and scholar of international, post-colonial feminist studies in the visual arts. Pollock was born in South Africa, but has spent most of her life in Britain.

Q

R

• Dorothy Ripley (1767-1832) was an English missionary and writer who spent thirty years in the United States trying to secure better conditions for the slaves. Later in her life she became involved in prison reform.
• Dora Russell (1894 – 1986) - British progressive campaigner, advocate of marriage reform, birth control and female emancipation

S

• Nawal el-Saadawi (born 1931) - Egyptian writer and doctor, advocate for women’s health and equality
• Shadi Sadr (born 1975) - Iranian women's rights activist
• Margaret Sanger (Higgins) (1879 – 1966) - American birth control activist, sex educator, and nurse, who popularized the term birth control, opened the first birth control clinic in the USA, and established Planned Parenthood.
• Jean-Paul Sartre (1905 – 1980) - French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He is also noted for his long polyamorous relationship with feminist author and social theorist Simone de Beauvoir.
• Hoda Shaarawi (1879 – 1947) - Egyptian feminist, organizer for the Mubarrat Muhammad Ali (women’s social service organization), the Union of Educated Egyption Women and the Wafdist Women’s Central Committee, founder and first president of the Egyptian Feminist Union
• Countess Gertrude Guillaume-Schack (1845-1903) German women's rights activist who pioneered the fight against state-regulated prostitution in Germany. She also became active in organizing workers associations for German women. She moved to England in 1886, where she became involved in Socialist organizations, but fell out with Friedrich Engels.
• Shamima Shaikh (1960 – 1998) - South African activist, member of the Muslim Youth Movement of South Africa, proponent of Islamic gender equality
• Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (Godwin) (1797 – 1851) - English novelist
• Kate Sheppard (1847 – 1934) - New Zealand suffragette, influential in winning voting rights for women in 1893 (the first national election in which women were allowed to vote)
• Shahla Sherkat (born 1956) - Iranian journalist
• Susan Sontag (1933 – 2004) - American author, visual theorist, and political activist. Her parents were Jack Rosenblatt and Mildred Jacobsen. After Susan's father's death, her mother married Nathan Sontag, whose name Susan took. During her eight years of marriage to Philip Rieff, she and Rieff had a son named Philip.
• Gloria Steinem (born 1934) - American feminist, journalist, and social and political activist who became nationally recognized as a leader of, and media spokeswoman for, the women's liberation movement in the late 1960s and 1970s. Her mother, Ruth Steinem (Nuneviller) (c.1905 – d.), was a Presbyterian of Scottish and German descent, and her father, Leo Steinem, was the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany and Poland.
• Emily Howard Stowe (1831 – 1903) - Canadian physician, advocate for women's inclusion in the medical professional community, founder of the Canadian Women's Suffrage Association
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815 – 1902) - American social activist, abolitionist, and suffragette, organizer of the 1848 Women's Rights Convention, co-founder of the National Woman's Suffrage Association and the International Council of Women

T

• Táhirih (1817 – 1852) - Bábí poet, theologian, and proponent of women's rights in 19th-century Iran.
• Roya Toloui (born 1966) - Iranian-Kurdish women's rights activist

U-V

W

• Ida B. Wells (1862 – 1931) - American civil rights and anti-lynching activist, suffragette noted for her refusal to avoid media attention because she was African American
• Emma Willard (Hart) (1787 – 1870) - American advocate for women's education
• Sophia Williams (born 1938) - led 20,000 women in protest against the pass laws in South Africa on August 9, 1956. She was 18 years old at the time. August 9 is celebrated in South Africa as Women's Day.
• Mary Wollstonecraft (1759 – 1797) - English writer and philosopher; author of Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792), considered the first important feminist essay
• Elizabeth Clarke Wolstenholme Elmy (1833-1918) was a life-long campaigner and organiser, significant in the history of women's suffrage in the United Kingdom. She wrote essays and some poetry, using the pseudonyms E and Ignota.
• Fanny Bullock Workman (January 8, 1859 – January 22, 1925), was an American geographer, cartographer, explorer, travel writer, and mountaineer, notably in the Himalayas. She was one of the first female professional mountaineers; she not only explored but also wrote about her adventures. She set several women's altitude records, published eight travel books with her husband, and championed women's rights and women's suffrage.

X-Y-Z

• Malala Yousafzai (born 1997, Pakistan) - When she stood up for education for girls in the Swat Valley, the Taliban attempted to murder her. She survived a Talib's shot to her head. With Christina Lamb, she wrote I Am Malala, 2013, and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014.
• Stasa Zajovic (born 1953) - co-founder and coordinator of Women in Black, Belgrade, Serbia

List of suffragists and suffragettes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suffragists_and_suffragettes

adapted from Wikipedia's [2010] list

American (United States)

• Jane Addams (1860 – 1935) - awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931
• Susan B. Anthony (1820 – 1906) - early leader of suffragist movement
• Anna L. "Annie" Arniel (Melvin) (1873, Harrington, DE – 1924)
• Clara Barton (1821 – 1912) - founded the American Red Cross
• Harriet Eaton Stanton Blatch (1856 – 1940)
• Amelia Bloomer (Jenks) (1818 – 1894) - suffragist, designer of feminist clothing
• Madeline McDowell Breckinridge (1872 – 1920)
• Sophonisba Breckinridge (1866 – 1948)
• Olympia Brown (1835 – 1926, daughter of Asa and Lephia Brown)
• Lucy Burns (1879, Brooklyn, NY – 1966, daughter of Edwards Burns)
• Carrie Chapman Catt (1859 – 1947)
• Lydia Maria Child (Francis) (1802 – 1880)
• Laura Clay (1849 – 1941)
• Voltairine de Cleyre (1866, Leslie, MI – 1912, Chicago, IL, buried in Waldheim Cemetery [now Forest Home Cemetery], in Forest Park; her son Harry, born June 12, 1890, was fathered by partner James B. Elliot)
• Frederick Douglass (1818 – 1895) - social reformer, orator, writer and statesman. After escaping from slavery, he became a leader of the abolitionist movement, and supporter of women's suffrage.
• Helen Douglass (Pitts) (1837 – 1903; daughter of Gideon and Jane Pitts, and descended from John Alden and Priscilla Alden)
• Abigail Jane Duniway (Scott) (1834 – 1915)
• Max Eastman (1883 – 1969) - helped found the Men's League for Women's Suffrage in 1910
• Eve Ensler (1953 -) Playwright, writer, performer, feminist, and activist, best known for her play The Vagina Monologues.
• Helga Estby (1860, Christiana [aka Oslo], Norway – 1942; wife of Ole Estby, mother of Helga)
• Clara S. Foltz (1849 – 1934)
• Elizabeth "Lizzie" Beatrice Cooke Fouse (1875 – 1952)
• Matilda Joslyn Gage (1826 – 1898)
• Sarah Moore Grimké (1792 – 1873) - South Carolina abolitionist and suffragist
• Eliza Caroline "Lida" Calvert Obenchain (pen name Eliza Calvert Hall) (1856 – 1935)
• Florence Jaffray Harriman (1870 – 1967) - socialite, suffragist, social reformer, organizer, and diplomat
• Josephine K. Henry (Williamson) (1846 – 1928) - Progressive Era women's rights leader, suffragist, social reformer, and writer
• Julia Ward Howe (1819 – 1910) - author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic"
• Ada James (1876 – 1952) - suffragist, social worker, and reformer
• Sara Jane Lippincott (Clarke), her pen name "Grace Greenwood" (1823 – 1904) - first woman reporter on the New York Times payroll, advocate for social reform and women's rights
• Florence Luscomb (1887 – 1985) - architect and women's suffrage activist
• Inez Boissevain (Milholland) (1886 – 1916) - suffragist and labor lawyer
• Harriet May Mills (1857 – 1935) - civil and women's rights activist
• Abigail Crawford Milton (1881 – 1991)
• Lucretia Mott (1793 – 1880) - American Quaker, abolitionist, and women's rights activist
• Alice Paul (1885 – 1977) - suffragist
• Rev. Dr. Anna Pauline "Pauli" Murray (1910 – 1985; daughter of William H. and Agnes Georgiana Murray (Fitzgerald))
• Wenona Pinkham (1882 – 1930)
• Anita Pollitzer (1894 – 1975) - suffragist
• Elizabeth Seldon Rogers (White) (1868 – 1950)
• Margaret Sanger (Higgins) (1879 – 1966) - birth control activist, sex educator, and nurse
• Julia Sears (1840 – 1929) - suffragist
• Dr Anna Howard Shaw (1847 – 1919) - physician, suffragist, and the first ordained female Methodist minister in the USA
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815 – 1902) - abolitionist, and leading figure of the early women's rights movement
• Doris Stevens (1892 – 1963)
• Lucy Stone (1818 – 1893) - abolitionist and early leader of suffragist movement
• Lydia Taft (Chapin) (1712 – 1778) - the first woman known to legally vote in colonial America. This occurred at a Town Meeting in the Massachusetts Colony's town of Uxbridge.
• Martha Carey Thomas (1857 – 1935) - educator, suffragist, linguist, and second president of Bryn Mawr College
• Sojourner Truth, her self-given name (born Isabella Baumfree) (c. 1797 – 1883) - African-American abolitionist and women's rights activist
• Harriet Tubman (born Araminta Ross; c. 1822 – 1913) - African-American abolitionist, Union spy during the American Civil War, and suffragist
• Zerelda Gray Wallace (Sanders) (1817 – 1901)
• Mina Van Winkle (1875 – 1932) - social worker, suffragist, and police lieutenant
• Ida B. Wells (1862 – 1931) - African-American journalist, suffragist and an early leader in the civil rights movement
• Victoria Woodhull (1838 – 1927) - suffragist

Australian

• Muriel Matters (1877 – 1969)
• Edith Cowan (1861 – 1932)
• Henrietta Dugsdale (1827 – 1918)
• Fanny Furner (1864 – 1938)
• Louisa Lawson (Albury) (1848 – 1920)
• Mary Lee (Walsh) (1821 – 1909)
• Emma Miller (1839 – 1917)
• Elizabeth Nicholls (1850 – 1943)
• Rose Scott (1847 – 1925)
• Catherine Helen Spence (1825 – 1910)
• Jessie Street (Lillingston) (1889 – 1970)

Austrian

• Marianne Hainisch (1839 – 1936)

Belgian

• Marie Popelin (1846 – 1913)

British and Northern Irish

• Elizabeth Garrett Anderson (1836 – 1917)
• Dr. Louisa Garrett Anderson, CBE (1873 – 1943)
• Nancy Witcher Astor, Viscountess Astor (1879 – 1964)
• Dorothea Beale (1831 – 1906)
• Mary Eleaner Sanders (1881 – 1973)
• Lydia Ernestine Becker (1827 – 1890)
• Ethel Bentham (1861 – 1931)
• Annie Besant (1847 – 1933)
• Rosa May Billinghurst (1875 – 1953)
• Teresa Billington-Greig (1877 – 1964)
• Margaret Bondfield (1873 – 1953)
• Catherine Booth (1829 – 1890)
• Emilia Jessie Boucherett (1825-1905)
• Elsie Edith Bowerman (1889 – 1973)
• Ursula Bright (1835-1915)
• Vera Mary Catlin (1893 – 1970)
• Frances Buss (1827 – 1894)
• Josephine Elizabeth Butler (1828 – 1906)
• Mona Caird (1854? – 1932)
• Anne Clough (1820 – 1892)
• Leonora Cohen (1873 – 1978)
• Margaret Cole (1893 – 1980)
• Selina Cooper (1864 – 1946)
• Richmal Crompton (1890 – 1969)
• Mary Crudelius (McLean) (1839 – 1877)
• Emily Davies (1830 – 1921)
• Emily Davison (1872 – 1913)
• Charlotte Despard (French) (1844 – 1937)
• Flora Drummond (Gibson, later Simpson) (1878 – 1949)
• Emily Faithfull (1835-1895)
• Dame Millicent Fawcett (1847 – 1929)
• Elizabeth Fry (1780 – 1845)
• Edith Margaret Garrud (1872 – 1971)
• Nellie Hall (1895 – ?)
• Cicely Hamilton (born Hammill) (1872 – 1952)
• Jane Ellen Harrison (1850 – 1928)
• Evelina Haverfield (1867 – 1920)
• Emily Hobhouse (1860 – 1926)
• Winifred Holtby (1898 – 1935)
• Elizabeth How-Martyn (1875 – 1954)
• Elsie Inglis (1864 – 1917)
• Sophia Jex-Blake (1840 – 1912)
• Ellen Isabel Jones (Cotton) (? – c.1948)
• Annie Kenney (1879 – 1953)
• Grace Kimmins (1871 – 1954)
• Anne Knight (1786 – 1862)
• Annie Knight (1895 – 2006)
• Jennie Lee, Baroness Lee of Asheridge (1904 – 1988)
• Lilian Lenton (1891 – 1972)
• Constance Georgina Lytton (1869 – 1923)
• Margaret Mackworth, 2nd Viscountess Rhondda (1883 – 1958)
• Sarah Mair (1846 – 1941)
• Dora Marsden (1882 – 1960)
• Charlotte Marsh (1887 – 1961) [daughter of Arthur Hardwick Marsh (1842 – 1909)]
• Harriet Martineau (1802 – 1876)
• (Jenny Julia) Eleanor Aveling (Marx) (1855 – 1898)
• Harriet McIlquham (1837-1910)
• Alice Meynell (1847 – 1922)
• John Stuart Mill (1806 – 1873) and Harriet Taylor Mill (1807 – 1858)
• Hannah Mitchell (Webster) (1872 – 1956)
• Dora Montefiore (Fuller) (1851 – 1933)
• Flora Murray (1869 – 1923)
• Mary Neal (1860 – 1944)
• Alison Roberta Noble Neilans (1884 – 1942)
• Florence Nightingale ("The Lady with the Lamp") (1820 – 1910)
• Ada Nield Chew (1870 – 1945)
• Christabel Pankhurst (1880 – 1958)
• Emmeline Pankhurst (1858 – 1928)
• Estelle Sylvia (Sylvia) Corio (1882 – 1960)
• Adela Pankhurst (1885 – 1961)
• Edith Pechey (1845 – 1908)
• Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence, Baroness Pethick-Lawrence (1867 – 1954)
• Eleanor Rathbone (1872 – 1946)
• Mary Reid aka Mary Reid MacArthur (1880 – 1921)
• Mary Richardson (1889 – 1961)
• Edith Rigby (Rayner) (1872 – 1948)
• Elizabeth Robins (1862 – 1952)
• Rona Robinson (1881 – 1973)
• Esther Roper (1868 – 1938)
• [Agnes] Maude Royden (1876 – 1956)
• Alice Elizabeth Scatcherd (1842-1906)
• Ethel Smyth (1858 – 1944)
• Ethel Snowden, Viscountess Snowden, born Ethel Annakin (1881 – 1951)
• Flora Stevenson (1839 – 1905)
• Louisa Stevenson (1835 – 1908)
• Helena Swanwick (Sickert) (1864 – 1939)
• Elizabeth Thompson, Lady Butler (1846 – 1933)
• Dr Alice Drysdale Vickery (1844-1929)
• Marion Wallace Dunlop (1864 – 1942)
• Harriet Shaw Weaver (1876 – 1961)
• Beatrice Webb (Potter) (1858 – 1943)
• Rebecca West (born Cicely Isabel Fairfield) (1892 – 1983)
• Olive Wharry (1886 – 1947)
• Anna Doyle Wheeler (1785 – 1848)
• Ellen Wilkinson (1891 – 1947)

Canadian

• Henrietta Muir Edwards (1849 – 1931)
• Nellie McClung (born Nellie Letitia Mooney) (1873 – 1951)
• Louise McKinney (Crummy) (1868 – 1931)
• Emily Murphy (born Emily Gowan Ferguson) (1868 – 1933)
• Irene Parlby (born Irene Marryat) (1868 – 1965)
• Emily Stowe (1831 – 1903)

Dutch

• Aletta Henriëtte Jacobs (1854 – 1929)

French

• Hubertine Auclert (1848 – 1914)
• Maria Deraismes (1828 – 1894)
• Jeanne Deroin (1805 – 1894)
• Marguerite Durand (1864 – 1936)
• Olympe de Gouges (c.1745 – 1793)
• Madeleine Pelletier (1874 – 1939)
• Pauline Roland (1805 – 1852)
• Séverine (born Caroline Rémy de Guebhard) (1855 – 1929)
• Flora Tristan (1803 – 1844)

German

• Hedwig Dohm (aka Marianne Adelaide Hedwig Dohm) (Schlesinger, later Schleh) (1831 – 1919)
• Countess Gertrude Guillaume-Schack (1845-1903)
• Clara Zetkin (Eissner) (1857 – 1933)

Italian

• Anna Maria Mozzoni (1837 – 1920)

New Zealander

• Kate Sheppard (1847 – 1934

Irish

• Louie Bennett (1870 – 1956)
• Norah Elam (Doherty), also known as Norah Dacre Fox (1878 – 1961)
• Eva Gore-Booth (1870 – 1926)
• Kathleen Lynn (1874 – 1955)
• Constance Georgine Markiewicz, Countess Markiewicz (Gore-Booth) (1868 – 1927)
• Helena Moloney (1884 – 1967)
• Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington (Johanna Mary Sheehy) (1877 – 1946)
• Anna Maria Haslam
• Sopia Newhman

Russian

• Alexandra Mikhailovna Domontovich (1872 – 1952)

Spanish

• Clara Campoamor (1888 – 1972)

Swedish

• Ellen Key (1849 – 1926)

Although the emphasis here is historical, feminists are more active today than ever. Feminists in the United States of America, for instance, can look to numerous achievements in recent decades. These include:

— Before the Women’s Liberation Movement (1960s-1970s) all newspapers across this country had classified employment ads that were separated into columns labeled “Female Help Wanted” and “Male Help Wanted.” For the most part, the lower paid jobs were in the female columns, and the better-paid positions were in the male columns.
— Women couldn’t get credit cards in their own names until 1975. Single women also were prohibited from obtaining mortgage for a house because banks wouldn’t lend to them. And there were few legal protections for women when they were divorced by their husbands.
— It was perfectly legal for a university to decline admission to a woman if administrators believed they already had enough women enrolled.
— It was feminists who added the word “sex” to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, thereby freeing women from employment discrimination by giving them legal power to fight it in court.
— Title IX, which prohibited discrimination in all schools thereby adding equality to sports and changing the lives of all women and men, was created because of feminists.