A Call To Action on International Women's Day 2024

Twelve years ago, I borrowed a friend’s camera and set out to document the blossoming movement of women farmers in my own small farming community. I had never touched a manual camera before. I didn’t really know what I was doing or how I was going to do it.

But I knew three things:

1) stories of women farmers were missing, leaving them uncounted, overlooked, and underserved; 

2) it was time for a documentary project that amplified their voices and uniquely centered their stories; 

and 3) this project couldn’t wait—if it was going to be done now, I had to do it myself. 

Fast forward to today, and I have built a body of work that honors women farmers around the world. 

I've photographed hundreds of women on their farms and in their homes, resulting in an ever-expanding photo archive with thousands of images. For eight years, I have produced a podcast that centers the diverse experiences of women in agriculture. I spoke on the TEDxSeattle stage about women farmers, past and present, who have kept us fed and clothed during national crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic. And most recently, I created a feature length documentary film called Women's Work: The Untold Story of America's Female Farmers, which will premiere this spring at the 2024 Rural Women's Studies Association Conference. I am so proud of this film, which celebrates and honors the labor and love that women have given to the land and our communities throughout history. It's also a small attempt to course-correct the enraging statistic that women occupy only half of 1% of recorded history.

Of course the path to women’s equality is not linear. For every leap forward, there are steps taken backward. The COVID crisis, for example, set global gender equality and parity back by years, if not decades. Gender-based violence remains a scourge that we must stamp out.  Women-led businesses receive just 2.3% of capital funding. And in a report just released today,  75% of agricultural work is done by women, yet they own or control less than 20% of agricultural lands.

There is still so much work to do. Join me in celebrating and sharing stories of the important women in your life.

Happy International Women’s Day and happy Women’s History Month!