Equal pay, domestic violence and political representation are issues high on the current agenda of women's rights.
A hundred years ago, it was no different, and the historical drama Suffragette, now playing in Australian threatres, examines the early feminist movement in London.
The great-granddaughter of Suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst says the battle for gender equality is not over.
Emma Hannigan reports.
British suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst towers large in feminist history.
In the early 1900s, she led a group of women in a guerrilla-style campaign, fighting for the vote.
Now, she and the members of her movement are the focus of a new movie, Suffragette.
It depicts their struggle as they bombed postboxes, cut telegraph wires and planted bombs in a fight so little-known today.
Ms Pankhurst was jailed and went on a hunger strike in her crusade for equal suffrage.
Her great-granddaughter, Ethiopian-born and now British-based Helen Pankhurst, says the women were fed up with decades of peaceful rallying that achieved nothing.
"She felt that the kind of 'slowly, slowly, be nice about how you ask for change' was just not getting anywhere, and they just got fed up. They got fed up with one set of inequality after another."
The storyline centres on a working wife and mother named Maud, whose life is changed forever when she is recruited to the suffragette movement led by Emmeline Pankhurst.
"Never surrender, never give up the fight."
Helen Pankhurst, the great-granddaughter, says she is confident the movie will inspire a new generation of feminists.
"I hope that the film will galvanise people a bit to think about how they behave, what they do, and that it will be part of that movement of social change."
As the suffragettes intensified their movement, the British government and police began using strong tactics to crack down on them.
"What (are) you going to do, lock us all up? We're in every home. We're half the human race. You can't stop us all."
Helen Pankhurst is continuing on her great-grandmother's mission, working with Care International to improve women's rights.
"We are increasingly a globalised community, and injustice anywhere affects us all."
She says she believes there is much left to achieve.
"I also passionately hope that it increases the debate about feminism and about the importance of continuing social change. We can't stand still."
"Never underestimate the power we women have to define our own destiny."
Share
