The women history forgot to teach you.
An archive of African women who fought for equality, rights, and change.
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IndependenceAndrée Blouin
A Pan-African organizer from the Central African Republic who turned the death of her small son, denied malaria medicine reserved for Europeans, into a fight that helped free Guinea and put her at Patrice Lumumba's side in Congo.
ContemporaryAngélique Kidjo
Beninese singer who refused to perform propaganda for a dictatorship, fled to Paris in 1983, and became a five-time Grammy winner, UNICEF ambassador, and the first Black African artist honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
IndependenceBibi Titi Mohammed
The Dar es Salaam singer who talked thousands of women into joining Tanganyika's independence movement, helped found a nation, then was erased from its story after a treason trial, until historians restored her name.
IndependenceDjamila Bouhired
Algerian resistance fighter of the Battle of Algiers whose torture and death sentence became a global scandal that helped expose the brutality of French colonial rule. She walked free as Algeria won independence and remains one of the revolution's most enduring faces.
IndependenceDoria Shafik
The Egyptian philosopher and publisher who stormed parliament with 1,500 women and starved herself until Egypt promised women the vote, then was erased from history for defying Nasser.
Articles & Explainers
When Men Go to War, Women Suffer: The Rwanda Genocide and What Was Done to Women
In 100 days in 1994, between 250,000 and 500,000 women were raped in Rwanda. This is the story of why it happened, what the world did about it, and how Rwandan women rebuilt an entire country from the ruins.
Ten Years in Prison for the Pill That Keeps Nigerian Mothers Alive
Nigeria's Senate is debating raising the punishment for supplying abortion drugs from 3 to 10 years. The pill at the centre of that law is the same one keeping women in villages from bleeding to death after childbirth.
6,400 Miles Past the Moon and Still Not Far Enough
Christina Koch just became the first woman to travel around the Moon. The comment sections proved exactly why that milestone still matters.
What Her Cloth Said When She Could Not Speak
Across East Africa, women have been buying, wearing, and gifting printed cloths that carry messages most people cannot read. A kanga is never just a kanga. It is a letter you wear on your body.
The Voice That Crossed the Sea: Charlotte Maxeke and the Long Road Home
Before she was the Mother of Black Freedom in South Africa, she was a girl with a voice that filled concert halls in London. This is how a singer became a scholar, then a force the colonial state could not ignore.
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Key moments in African women's history
