March is Women’s History Month, and you can celebrate by informing yourself. Women’s History is an important topic in the history of the United States because women helped to shape parts of our history. During the Civil War, women played the important roles of nurses who brought our soldiers back to health. Women later took a stand for themselves during the Women’s Suffrage Movement, which lasted from around the 1840’s until the 19^th amendment, which states that the United States cannot deny or abridge a citizen the right to vote based upon sex, was passed and ratified in 1920. The next task women faced was their liberation, which sparked the Women’s Liberation Movement. This developed in the late 1960’s when women became tired of being “home-makers” and wished to do more with their lives and wished to end gender inequalities. This movement still extends today. You can learn more about these issues in several ways.

First, you might try visiting the Women’s History Month website. This provides some basic information on the celebration of the month and how the national recognition came to be.

You can also visit our informative display in the library. The display includes some information on important faces of women’s history month, like Betty Friedan and Susan B. Anthony. The display also includes an interactive question of the week. For the interactive question, if you answer correctly and your name is drawn, you can win a small prize from the library! The display is located in the front lobby of the library. Stop on by!

Lastly, you can inform yourself by reading some of the great books or watching the fantastic videos that we have available. Several are featured in the Women’s History Month Display, and here are some more you might want to check out:

Altogether, Women’s History is a topic worth looking into. You can learn more by contacting us here at the library: iuref@iue.edu. Happy reading, searching, and learning!