It’s a cliché, but I can honestly say that history is something I have always had an interest in. Having such a passion – and knowing that it is a passion – has made me extremely lucky in terms of my studies, in that choosing my options for GCSE, A-Level, and finally my degree, was relatively simple. In fact, I’ve been doubly lucky, as I was also able to follow my love for Spanish alongside history, and am now approaching the end of my second year studying them.

It’s interesting, though – and this is something I’ve talked about before. I’ve learned more about women’s history and women in history through my Spanish course than I have through my history modules. On one occasion last year, the two sides of my degree actually coincided, in which I was studying the Aztec Empire in both. In Spanish lectures, we looked at La Malinche and her impact on the conquest, which was sizable, and important enough that even Cortés made reference to her in his recollections. Meanwhile, in history lectures on the same topic and time period, there was no mention. 

This isn’t an accusation against anyone or a criticism of my department. Really, it’s more to say that my experiences of studying history at university (which I love) has made even clearer the fact that, while history may be taught, women’s history often isn’t.

Most of my studies relating specifically to women, across all my years of learning history, have been linked to the British suffragettes in the early 1900s. This academic year I was able to take a US history module that introduced me to feminism in the US and the suffrage movement there. One or two women have been looked out outside of the boundaries of female-specific topics, but very rarely, and very little. 

This trend of women’s stories being left out of the picture (plus the unexpected free time granted by the pandemic) was the push I needed to begin this blog. Because women were leaders and scientists and writers and inventors and activists just the same as men were, and they deserve to be told too.

There were, of course, reasons for starting this page other than spite and built-up frustration. First and foremost, I wanted to learn. Looking into specific stories of both the known and unknown – and those in the middle – is where my interest lies; for me, history is less in the big sweeps, and more in the individuals and their actions.

It’s unfortunate that the everyday person’s story is often lost (and the same can be true for many women and minorities), but they are invaluable where we can find them. Further, individuals often have more of an impact than we realise – I have chosen to focus my final year dissertation on an individual, trade unionist Mary Macarthur. Even the small bit of research I’ve done so far has taught me so much not only about her, but also about how she impacted the course of the wider socio-political conditions in Britain at the time. It’s a fascinating topic and excites me more than anything I’ve studied before, so I’m looking forward to properly getting stuck into it over the coming year.

Yesterday, I asked on my instagram story what history means to you. I want to share some of those responses, but first I should probably sum up what it means to me. And it is, simply: stories. The knowledge of humans who lived before us, who are not so different from ourselves. It’s the dip in a stone staircase from hundreds of pairs of feet passing through over many years, and all the other remnants left behind.

It’s life.

And now that my own pretentious opinion is out of the way, here’s what some of you said (anonymised for privacy):

• ‘there is everything to discover’
• ‘Lessons from the past. Hope for the future’
• ‘it shows us how we got to where we are today which is so important for us to understand so we can work on making a better future!’
• ‘History is a way to learn about today as much as it is the past’

History is an entirely subjective thing, meaning different things to different people, depending on where their interests and passions lie. For me, that’s in learning about women’s voices, and in the telling of stories, and I hope to continue to do both of these things with this blog.

Thanks for reading, if you’ve made it this far, congratulations on getting through my long-winded, probably moderately nonsensical explanation of why I love history!