March is Women's History Month, and people and organizations across the country are finding interesting ways to celebrate this year's theme, "Celebrating Women of Character, Courage, and Commitment." For example, The Huffington Post featured an article entitled "Celebrating Women's History Month -- On Mars," which recounts the advances made by female scientists on the study of Mars. As for events, The Times and Democrat reports that The South Carolina State Museum in Columbia, South Carolina is hosting a virtual exhibit of art by Addie Sim, a South Carolina Civil War-era artist. The exhibit entitled "The Art and Life of Addie Sims: A Look into Her World" opened on March 15, 2014. These are just a few of the exciting happenings so far, and there are still more to come. To learn more about Women's History Month and other organized celebrations, check out the official website here.
In celebration of Women's History Month, we at the UGA Press would like to highlight new and forthcoming additions to the University of Georgia Press series Southern Women: Their Lives and Times:
- NORTH CAROLINA WOMEN: THEIR LIVES AND TIMES, edited by Michele Gillespie and Sally G. McMillen, highlights North Carolina’s progressive streak and its positive impact on women’s education—for white and black alike—beginning in the antebellum period on through new opportunities that opened up in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They explore the ways industrialization drew large numbers of women into the paid labor force for the first time and what the implications of this tremendous transition were; they also examine the women who challenged traditional gender roles, as political leaders and labor organizers, as runaways, and as widows. The volume is especially attuned to differences in region within North Carolina, delineating women’s experiences in the eastern third of the state, the piedmont, and the western mountains. It became available on February 15, 2014.
- GEORGIA WOMEN: THEIR LIVES AND TIMES—VOLUME 2, edited by Ann Short Chirhart and Kathleen Ann Clark, discusses Georgia women who were instrumental to state and national politics even before they achieved suffrage, and as essays on Lillian Smith, Frances Pauley, Coretta Scott King, and others demonstrate, they played a key role in twentieth-century struggles over civil rights, gender equality, and the proper size and reach of government. While many of the volume’s essays take a fresh look at relatively well-known figures, readers will also have the opportunity to discover women who were vital to Georgia’s history yet remain relatively obscure today. Collectively, the life stories portrayed in this volume deepen our understanding of the multifaceted history of not only Georgia women but also the state itself. Mark your calendars for this book's publication on July 1, 2014.
Lastly, check out the article by Babble.com, "Women’s History Month: 5 Ways to Celebrate the Women In Your Family with Your Kids," for inspiration on how to celebrate the women in your history, life, and family.
