Women's History Month

Posted on Feb 24, 2020

March is Women's History Month! Celebrate women and learn more about the female experience with Austin PBS programming.

Rise Up: Songs of the Women’s Movement
This is a historic documentary music special that showcases anthems and hit songs from the 1900s through the mid 1980s and explores how music helped propel the growth of the Women’s Liberation Movement, inspiring broad changes such as voting rights, reproductive health, gender inclusiveness and increased educational and economic opportunities. The dynamic soundtrack has songs by Bessie Smith, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Lesley Gore, Aretha Franklin, Helen Reddy, Loretta Lynn, Janis Ian, Holly Near, Gloria Gaynor, Dolly Parton, Joan Jett, Cyndi Lauper, Melissa Etheridge, Annie Lennox, Aretha Franklin, Tina Turner and others. Interviews with activists and feminists such as Gloria Steinem, Jane Fonda and Toni Van Pelt (President of NOW) are also included.
Tuesday, March 3 at 8:25 p.m. on Austin PBS

Xavier Riddle And The Secret Movie: I Am Madam President
In the one-hour special, Xavier’s sister Yadina meets some of the boldest women in history and learns how to do something that’s never been done before.
Monday, March 16 at 8 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. on Austin PBS

American Masters: Holly Near
Experience the power of song in the struggle for equality through the story of feminist singer and activist Holly Near. For the last 40 years, she has worked on global social justice coalition-building in the women's and lesbian movements. Directed by Jim Brown.
Friday, March 20 at 9:30 p.m. on Austin PBS

Black Ballerina
This is a film of passion, opportunity, heartbreak and triumph of the human spirit. Set in the overwhelmingly white world of classical dance, it tells the stories of several black women from different generations who fell in love with ballet. Sixty years ago, while pursuing their dreams of careers in classical dance, Joan Myers Brown, Delores Browne and Raven Wilkinson (the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo's first black ballerina) confronted racism, exclusion and unequal opportunity in segregated mid-century America. In 2015, three young black women also pursue careers as ballerinas, and find that many of the same obstacles their predecessors faced are still evident in the ballet world today. Through interviews with current and former ballet dancers along with engaging archival photos and film, this documentary uses the ethereal world of ballet to engage viewers on a subject that reaches far outside the art world and compels viewers to think about larger issues of exclusion, equal opportunity and change.
Monday, March 23 at 9 p.m. on Austin PBS

Enemy of the Reich: The Noor Inayat Khan Story
In August of 1943, the last surviving clandestine radio operator in Paris desperately signaled London. Everything depended on her and the Gestapo was at the door. How did a Sorbonne educated musician and author of a book of fairy tales become a daring spy who died fighting the Nazis? With an American mother and Indian Muslim father, Noor Inayat Khan was an extremely unusual British agent, and her life spent growing up in a Sufi center of learning in Paris seemed an unlikely preparation for the dangerous work to come. Yet it was in this place of universal peace and contemplation that her remarkable courage was forged. When the Nazis invaded France, she joined Britain's Women's Auxiliary Air Force and was recruited as a spy, going to Paris to support the French Underground. For four crucial months, Noor was the only surviving radio operator in Paris, calling in the air-drop of weapons and supplies, and coordinating the rescue of downed allied fliers. She was ultimately betrayed by a French collaborator, and interrogated for months by the Gestapo. She never gave up any information, not even her real name, and she organized two breakouts from Gestapo headquarters. For this and the damage she did to the Nazis war efforts, she was executed in Dachau.
Tuesday, March 24 at 10 p.m. on Austin PBS

A Fine Line
Hear candid insights from world renowned chefs, including Lidia Bastianich, Dominique Crenn, Barbara Lynch and more and explore why less than 7% of head chefs and restaurant owners are women when traditionally women have always held the main role in the kitchen. The central narrative unfolds on a smalltown restaurateur and single mother on a mission to do what she loves while raising two kids with the odds stacked mightily against her. This personal, all-access story opens up a timely discussion on how to get more women into leadership while tackling important issues such as paid parental leave, affordable and accessible childcare and fair wages.
Monday, March 30 at 9 p.m. on Austin PBS