Articles & Explainers
31 articles. Context, analysis, and the bigger picture.
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.
The Secret Maps in Her Hair: How African Braids Carried Messages, Maps, and Freedom
Before there were letters or phones, African women were sending messages through braided patterns in their hair. Some of those patterns even mapped the way to freedom.
The Girl They Tried to Keep Hidden: The Story of Destiny Ayo Vaughan
Shipped from Nigeria to Ireland as a child with the promise of a better life, Destiny was held captive for five years. She was not supposed to survive. She was certainly not supposed to speak. She did both.
The Tignon Laws: When a Headwrap Became Resistance
In 1786, colonial Louisiana tried to control Black women by forcing them to cover their hair. They turned the restriction into one of history's most powerful fashion statements.
To the Mothers Who Gave Us Everything
A Mothering Sunday reflection on the African women who carried movements, raised revolutions, and wrote the truth, all while raising children who would inherit their courage.
The Revolution Is Uncomfortable. That's the Point.
Every generation of African women who pushed for change made people uncomfortable. The discomfort is not a flaw in the movement. It is proof that the movement is working.
They Didn't Call It Feminism Either
Most of the women who built the freedoms African women have today never used the word. That doesn't make what they did any less feminist.