Teach Secondary Issue 14.2

remove any opposition – a useful illustration of how ‘women fighting for change’ doesn’t necessarily mean that those women were on the side of democracy or progress. One pro-Mao rally organised in 1966 involved over 2 million attendees – a scale unimaginable in other countries. 20 th century China remains a challenging, yet fascinating topic to teach, with the plentiful propaganda posters produced at the time being ripe for classroom analysis. (Lest we forget, even now there’s only one party in China that people can actually vote for.) It’s interesting to note that women have consistently turned out in slightly higher numbers thanmen in every US presidential election held since 1984. At that time, however, Black women in South Africa still couldn’t vote. They only gained the right to do so in 1993, following the end of the Apartheid regime, under which white women had been able to vote since 1930. A representative past There continue to be some significant silences and gaps in the history of women that’s being taught in the classroom. Many history teachers will be familiar with the people and places highlighted above, but there’s so much more that we don’t yet know. Until Riddell found Kitty Marion’s diaries, her story was relatively unknown. Students must be taught that this is what historians do, and why it matters. To create active citizens – i.e. people who regularly vote, volunteer and feel empowered to change things – we must educate all students about a past that’s representative. Women’s rights are still very much under threat today in Afghanistan, Sudan and even in the USA. History teachers might not be able to solve the global issues that vex us now, but we can certainly educate the leaders of tomorrowwho perhaps one day will. The women cited here may not feature prominently in the textbooks you’re using, but they were there, amid the sights, sounds and smells of their respective times. We must do justice to their presence, and keep learning about them. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Gemma Hargraves is a history teacher, A Level examiner and secondary committee member of The Historical Association RECOMMENDED READING Black Tudors by Miranda Kaufmann (2018, Oneworld Publications) Death in Ten Minutes: The forgotten life of radical suffragette Kitty Marion by Fern Riddell (2018, Hodder & Stoughton) A series of free resources to support the teaching of lesson content about Kitty Marion can be downloaded via tinyurl. com/ts142-WH1 Liberty: The Lives and Times of Six Women in Revolutionary France by Lucy Moore (2009, Harper Perennial) The WomenWho Flew for Hitler: The True Story of Hitler’s Valkyries by Clare Mulley (2018, Pan) 69 teachwire.net/secondary H I S TO R Y