International Women’s Day
Renee
Good morning! I am here to speak to you about International Women’s Day, this Saturday, March 8th, 2025.
I’m always happy to speak about women in any context, but in researching this particular topic, I was surprised to realize that the history of this day dates all the way back to Vladimir Lenin who in 1922, declared that March 8th would be the official day honoring the role of women in the 1917 Russian Revolution.
The women of this time had 3 simple demands:
1.Peace 2.Bread 3.Land
Defying orders one morning, groups of women in textile factories left their work and went on strike—this led to a mass strike across Petrograd, now Saint Petersburg. The women even managed to persuade soldiers to join their cause. 7 days later, Tsar Nicholas II abdicated, and women were granted the right to vote.
The holiday gained global recognition upon being promoted by the United Nations in 1977, expanding to a symbol of women’s rights, including: gender equality and protection from violence and abuse.
Despite its universal recognition and despite the fact that American marketing industries love promoting holidays of all kinds, I had never really heard of International Women’s Day—until going abroad.
Women’s Day is a big day in Tajikistan, where I lived for 20 months during the pandemic when I couldn’t get back into China. Not knowing the history, that intrigued me—the disparity between the honor and recognition of women on this day versus the general surrounding context of all that women face every other day.
This photo was taken almost exactly 2 years ago on International Women’s Day with my teaching assistant Ms. Dilnoza and the remnants of a giant bouquet I was given that my cats, who were tiny kittens at the time, destroyed, tried to eat, and nearly died (so I had to put what was left up near the ceiling).
I am dedicating this speech to the women and girls of Tajikistan, which is why I am traditionally dressed here today.
According to UNICEF, approximately 25% of Tajik girls fail to complete compulsory primary education because of poverty and gender bias.
Poverty and gender bias are two distinct and equally important factors, but yet they go together. What I hope to illustrate by the end of this is that overcoming gender bias will help increase the education rate and thereby lift a nation like Tajikistan out of poverty.
Many areas of Tajik life are isolated from the modern world and technology, and traditional gender expectations have held firm.
--But this is beginning to change (more on that later)
In terms of the ritual of tradition, walking down the street in even the largest Tajik cities, you won’t see all the things that you will see here, but one thing you are guaranteed to see is a bridal shop on every street corner. (They were so eager to have me try on the headdress.)
I went to numerous weddings while there. Over and over, I was told how important this day is, that families will spend an entire life savings on this celebration, and if they don’t have the money, they will put it on credit.
In contrast, never once has my family asked me if or when I will get married. Yet without question, it was expected that I would go to college. My parents saved their entire lives, and I took out loans also, putting the tuition on credit, because education is the priority.
Tajik girls are expected to marry at 18. Often the marriage is arranged, and in the past, you might not have even seen your future husband until the wedding day, when you meet this person for the first time.
This, however, is slowly changing. I would listen to my coworkers who were going through the engagement process show me pictures of the men they were set to marry—describe elaborate meetings between the families and sometimes they are even asked to give an opinion (although they said there was really only one answer—one response option allowed)
-- because the social pressure of conformity remains strong.
After marriage, the new bride is initially sent to live with their husband’s family. The outcome of their lives is largely determined by the permissiveness or progressiveness of this new family’s household. Some families are more supportive than others.
If there was one phrase I heard over and over again, it was the need to “have permission”—to leave the house, to do anything.
In preparing for this speech, I interviewed a former language center student who later started working for the company too, and the message she wants to send is:
--“things are indeed changing and improving, but not fast enough [for her].”
Because even when women have permission to work, to go to school etc. There is still such strong social pressure to meet cultural expectations that women censor themselves: their behavior, their speech, social media usage, thoughts, aspirations, out of FEAR.
And now I present an example of HOPE that inspired me to take the job in Tajikistan in the first place.
This woman, Umeda, who is exactly my age but born a world apart, found herself married and then pregnant at 18, yet still trying to go to university—even though her mother-in-law would not give her any money for it. She described sitting in class, consumed with hunger, but without even 20 dirams to buy bread.
She went on to start a language center that grew into an empire. All of this she did against her new family’s wishes, although her success has changed their minds. Eventually, she earned a PhD and because a Fulbright Scholar in the US at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
And during that time, when she brought her family to the US, she was the one going to school and her husband was the one staying at home to take care of the children. Those children are now attending universities abroad: one in the US, one in Germany.
Her vision and ambition have changed the trajectory of her family’s life outcome for generations to come.
This picture of us here was taken, coincidentally, at a wedding that we were both attending. The bride was another of my teaching assistants and the daughter of her childhood friend (I haven’t been able to find out how she’s doing now because she’s no longer on social media).
During the interview, I asked Umeda what her vision of success looks like, and she said, “providing children, specifically girls with an education.”
The final point of emphasis I learned from her life adds that success is the conviction to use this education and opportunity to BE the change that you want to see around you in the world.
