The Cost of Erasure: Why We Must Defend Women’s History Month
Women’s history has never been freely given. It has been fought for, uncovered from archives, pieced together from erased narratives, and reclaimed from those who sought to silence it. From the radical suffragettes who endured state violence to Black women whose contributions have been buried under layers of systemic racism and sexism, women’s history has been deliberately obscured.
Women’s History Month is not a symbolic gesture or a performative nod to diversity, it is an act of political resistance. Yet, every year, its legitimacy is questioned. We hear the same dismissive arguments: “Why do we need a Women’s History Month?” “Isn’t it just virtue signalling?” “What about men’s history?” These challenges reveal a fundamental truth, history, as it has been told in mainstream narratives, is overwhelmingly men’s history.
The statistics are telling. In the UK’s GCSE History curriculum, fewer than 12% of named historical figures are women. In 2020, a study of British statues found that only 3% represented non-royal women, compared to the countless monuments honouring male politicians, generals, and scientists. The stories we tell, and the ones we don’t, shape how we understand power, progress, and whose contributions matter.
Women’s History Month is not about indulging in nostalgia. It is about setting the historical record straight and ensuring that women’s contributions are fully recognised. It is about honouring the past so that we do not repeat it.
1. Historical Erasure and the Need for Reclamation
For centuries, women’s contributions have been erased, misattributed, or relegated to footnotes. Consider the hidden figures of British history:
The Matchgirls’ Strike (1888), led by teenage working-class women, challenged the lethal working conditions at Bryant & May's match factory, where workers suffered from phosphorus poisoning and starvation wages. Their successful strike set a precedent for future women-led trade union activism, proving that working-class women were not passive victims, but powerful organisers who could force change.
The Ford Dagenham Women (1968), a group of sewing machinists in the male-dominated car manufacturing industry, went on strike demanding equal pay. Their struggle led to the passage of the 1970 Equal Pay Act, shaping labour rights for women across the UK. Despite this, pay inequality remains a structural issue, and their story is often reduced to a single event rather than an ongoing fight.
Mary Seacole, a Jamaican-British nurse, entrepreneur, and war hero, played a crucial role in providing medical care to British soldiers during the Crimean War, yet she was systematically excluded from mainstream historical accounts that glorified Florence Nightingale while erasing her contributions. Despite being rejected by the British War Office, she funded her own way to the war front and established the British Hotel, where she treated wounded soldiers.
The women of Bletchley Park, whose codebreaking genius helped turn the tide of World War II, were long dismissed as mere "clerical assistants," their intelligence and wartime efforts buried under a narrative that credited men with Britain’s victory. It took decades for their contributions to be acknowledged, despite the fact that 75% of Bletchley’s workforce were women, operating the world’s first programmable computers, breaking enemy codes, and revolutionising modern cryptography.
The Grunwick Strikers (1976-78), a group of predominantly South Asian women led by Jayaben Desai, stood at the forefront of one of the most significant labour struggles in British history. As immigrant women workers facing racism, sexism, and exploitative factory conditions, they took on an overwhelmingly white, male-dominated trade union movement that initially dismissed them. Their strike at the Grunwick film processing factory in London challenged not just low pay and brutal working conditions but also racist and patriarchal structures within the UK’s labour rights movement. Their resilience forced the wider labour movement to reckon with the experiences of women of colour, particularly migrant women, in British industry.
Women in the Miner’s Strike (1984-85), often portrayed as passive supporters, played a critical role in sustaining the strike, running community kitchens, organising political campaigns, and defying state repression. Women’s groups such as Women Against Pit Closures built lasting networks of solidarity, class resistance, and feminist organising that extended beyond the strike itself.
These examples illustrate that women’s history is not just a story of individual heroines, it is a story of collective struggle, intersectional resistance, and working-class solidarity. From Black radicalism to migrant labour activism, women have always been at the centre of social justice movements, even when history has tried to erase them.
This erasure is not incidental. It is a result of patriarchal, homo-transphobic, abelist and racist structures deciding which voices are valuable and which are expendable. Reclaiming women’s history is therefore not just about visibility, it is about dismantling the systems that erased them in the first place.
2. Intersectionality Matters: Whose History Are We Remembering?
If we are to celebrate Women’s History Month meaningfully, we must resist a sanitised version that centres only privileged white women while excluding working-class women, disabled women, Black and Brown women, LGBTQ+ women, and trans women.
Women’s struggles have never been monolithic. Black and ethnically minoritised women have had to fight both sexism and racism, often from within feminist movements themselves. Working-class women, from the Matchgirls’ Strike of 1888 to the Dagenham Ford factory workers, have been at the forefront of labour rights movements but remain underrepresented in mainstream history. Disabled women have led campaigns for accessible transport, independent living, and reproductive justice, yet their activism is rarely acknowledged.
We cannot allow Women’s History Month to become a whitewashed, middle-class celebration of a select few figures. It must be an act of reclamation that honours the full spectrum of women’s experiences.
3. Beyond the ‘Exceptional Woman’ Myth
The history that is told often focuses on the "exceptional" woman, figures like Marie Curie, Emmeline Pankhurst, or Ethel Smythe, while ignoring the millions of unnamed women whose collective action changed history.
This narrative is dangerous. It implies that only a handful of extraordinary women were capable of defying patriarchy, rather than acknowledging that historical change has always been driven by collective struggle.
The Dagenham Ford factory strike of 1968, which led to the Equal Pay Act, was won by working-class women, not a single figurehead.
The Greenham Common peace camp, one of the most sustained acts of anti-nuclear protest in British history, was led by thousands of ordinary women.
The Grunwick Strike of 1976-1978, led by South Asian women in London, challenged racism and exploitation in the British workplace.
Women’s history is not just a series of individual heroines, it is a story of movements, communities, and resistance.
4. Women’s History as Political Resistance
There is a reason why right-wing politicians seek to control school curriculums, and why authoritarian regimes fear history. History shapes our present, it determines whose voices are valued, whose struggles are recognised, and whose oppression is denied.
Women’s history is not neutral. It is deeply political.
When we teach the history of the Matchgirls’ Strike, we challenge the idea that working-class women were passive victims.
When we remember the Mangrove Nine, we expose the racism of the British legal system.
When we honour trans women’s role in the LGBTQ+ rights movement, we reject the transphobic revisionism that seeks to erase them.
History is a battleground, and Women’s History Month is a fight against those who wish to rewrite the past to justify the injustices of the present.
5. The Relevance of Women’s History to Today’s Struggles
The struggles of the past are not over.
The gender pay gap persists—in 2023, UK women were still earning 14.3% less than men on average.
Domestic violence remains endemic, with a woman in the UK killed by a man every three days.
Black and Ethnically minoritised women face higher rates of poverty and state violence.
Reproductive rights are under attack, from the rollback of abortion rights in the US to Northern Ireland’s restrictive abortion laws.
Women’s History Month is not just about looking backwards. It is about using historical knowledge to strengthen today’s movements.
6. Policy, Education, and Institutional Recognition
Despite its importance, women’s history is still not fully integrated into education systems. The UK’s National Curriculum still overwhelmingly focuses on white, male-centric narratives.
We must demand systemic change.
Schools should teach the history of women’s suffrage alongside broader political reform.
The contributions of Black British women to civil rights should be mandatory, not optional.
Media representation should move beyond tokenistic tributes in March, and instead integrate women’s perspectives into mainstream historical narratives year-round.
7. Combating Backlash and Historical Revisionism
We are living in an era of backlash.
The #MeToo movement has faced relentless attempts at de-legitimisation.
Trans women are being erased from feminist histories they helped build.
Even Women’s History Month itself is dismissed, as reactionary forces push for a return to rigid, patriarchal norms.
This backlash is proof that Women’s History Month is more necessary than ever.
The fight to remember is the fight for justice.
Reflective Questions
Whose histories have been left out of mainstream narratives, and why?
How does reclaiming women’s history disrupt patriarchal and racist systems?
How can we use historical knowledge to strengthen today’s feminist struggles?
What does a truly intersectional Women’s History Month look like?
Final Thoughts: Why This Month—and Every Month—Matters
Women’s History Month is not about empty celebration. It is about fighting for the right to be remembered.
Because when we remember, we resist. And when we resist, we change history.
Reading List
Women’s History and Feminist Struggles
Davis, A. (1981). Women, Race, & Class. London: Women’s Press.
Eddo-Lodge, R. (2017). Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race. London: Bloomsbury.
McGregor, S. (2021). Overlooked: A History of Women in the Workplace. London: Penguin.
Mirza, H. S. (1997). Black British Feminism: A Reader. London: Routledge.
Rowbotham, S. (2015). Women's Consciousness, Man's World. London: Verso Books.
Intersectionality and Women’s History
Crenshaw, K. (1989). Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine. University of Chicago Legal Forum.
hooks, b. (2000). Feminism is for Everybody: Passionate Politics. London: Pluto Press.
Smith, B. (1982). Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism. Boston: South End Press.
Spivak, G. C. (1988). Can the Subaltern Speak? Basingstoke: Macmillan.
British Women's Activism and Labour Movements
Atkinson, D. (2018). Rise Up Women! The Remarkable Lives of the Suffragettes. London: Bloomsbury.
Mass Observation Archive (2012). Women’s Voices from the Second World War. London: Penguin.
Pankhurst, S. (1914). The Suffragette: The History of the Women's Militant Suffrage Movement 1905-1910. London: Virago.
Winslow, B. (2018). Sisterhood and After: An Oral History of the UK Women's Liberation Movement, 1968-Present. London: Oxford University Press.
Prasad, A. (2020). The Grunwick Strike 1976-78: A Legacy of Solidarity. London: Lawrence & Wishart.
McDowell, L. (2014). Working Lives: Gender, Migration and Employment in Britain, 1945-2007. London: Wiley.
Perry, K. (2013). London is the Place for Me: Black Britons, Citizenship and the Politics of Race. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (Includes discussions on South Asian and Black women's activism in British labour movements.)
Panayi, P. (2010). An Immigration History of Britain: Multicultural Racism since 1800. Harlow: Pearson Education. (Explores the role of migrant women in the UK’s labour struggles, including the Grunwick strikers.)
Women’s Rights, Social Policy, and Law
Freedman, E. (2003). No Turning Back: The History of Feminism and the Future of Women. New York: Ballantine Books.
McRobbie, A. (2009). The Aftermath of Feminism: Gender, Culture and Social Change. London: SAGE.
Pilcher, J. and Whelehan, I. (2017). Key Concepts in Gender Studies. London: SAGE.
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