Historical Badasses


[Image Description: A portrait of Nur Jahan.] via Cultural India

Nur Jahan, the twentieth wife: the Empress who stole her husband’s thunder

Safa Shoaib
Patsy Mink stands at a podium to announce the creation of the Congressional Asian American Pacific Congress. Behind her, from left to right, stands Representatives Don Edwards and Norman Mineta, House Delegate Robert Underwood, Representatives Nancy Pelosi and Neil Abercrombie.

Remembering Patsy Mink, a trailblazer in Asian American politics

Helena Ong
A suffragette meeting in Caxton Hall, Manchester England. Banners showing the WSPU slogan "Deeds Not Words" hang above.

Civil disobedience in a corset: the hard truth behind England’s suffragettes

Helena Ong
On the left, a portrait of a woman, the Rani of Jhansi, shows her clad in a tradition Indian dress and jewelry. On the right, there is an image of a statue of the Rani of Jhansi on a horse. A boy, her son, is strapped to her back while she wields a sword in the air.

Queen Lakhshmibai might have lost her battle, but forever won respect in the hearts of many

Tayyaba Rehman
[Image description: painting of a young woman with bonnet writing a with a quill. ] 'Lady Writing a Letter with her Maid' by Johannes Vermeer, c. 1670 (via National Gallery of Ireland).

Meet María de Zayas, the first author to publish under her own name in Spain

Beatriz Valero de Urquia
An image of a mountain joined by four images of a woman in Armenian clothing.

Meet Armen Ohanian, the belly dancer who defied every stereotype of a Middle Eastern woman

Camilla Selian Meeker
[Image description: Two women in history are featured side by side.] via Wikimedia Commons

6 badass women you probably didn’t learn about in school

Zara Shabir

Remembering unsung hero of Pride Sylvia Rivera: a transgender rights activist queen

Esthefany Castillo

14 trailblazing Egyptian women who made history

Amira Badawey
Native Americans

4 badass Native American women from history

Asma Elgamal