Woman's Hour - Show-women, Women and the general election, Smartphone-free kids

Episode Date: May 23, 2024

There will be a general election on 4 July. Campaigning will start at the end of next week, but already some of the key players are speaking out. What are women's top concerns in this election? What do women want addressed? Anita Rani speaks to Professor Rosie Campbell, professor of politics and director of the Global Institute for Women's Leadership at King's College London, who has been looking at women's voting behaviour for many years.Head teachers who are a part of St Albans Primary Schools Consortium have urged parents not to give their children a smartphone until they are aged 14. Anita speaks to Rachel Harper, principal of a primary school in County Wicklow in Ireland about what advice she would offer one year after she and seven other headteachers in her town asked parents not to allow their children phones until they were older.Olivier award-winning theatre maker Marisa Carnesky is taking over an entire street at this years Brighton Festival with her show, Carnesky's Showwomxn Sideshow Spectacular, honouring the forgotten women of the circus. Marisa shares with Anita the lost history of ground-breaking women magicians, aerial artists and sword climbers and how their stories are being explored through a new generation of performers.A Chinese blogger who was jailed for four years for her reporting on the first Covid outbreak in Wuhan, has been released from prison. The media watchdog Reporters Without Borders shared a video showing the blogger, Zhang Zhan, saying she had been released on schedule and thanking everyone for their concern. The former lawyer was jailed after she travelled to Wuhan to document the outbreak in a series of widely-shared online videos. She was due to be freed last week but friends and supporters were concerned when they were unable to contact her. Anita speaks to the Guardian's senior China correspondent Amy Hawkins, who is following the story.Gemmologist Helen Molesworth is the Senior Jewellery Curator at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and Professor of Jewellery at the Geneva University of Art and Design. In her new book, Precious: The History and Mystery of Gems, she explores the geology, symbolism and history of gemstones through some of their famous owners and those that have courted controversy. Helen explores their enduring fascination with Anita.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Rebecca Myatt Studio manager: Bob Nettles

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning, welcome to Woman's Hour. The summer of 2024 has taken a new turn. You may have heard there's going to be a general election. But what we are interested in is how women vote, or rather you. Have you already made up your mind or will you be waiting to hear what all the parties have to say for themselves in the run-up? What are the main issues that will sway you? Is it healthcare, childcare, taxation, benefits,

housing, money, business opportunities, the makeup of the parties, their values, the scandals? It's a little test, if you like, of the women who listen to Woman's Hour. What is important to you when it comes to voting for the next government? Shortly, I'll be speaking to Professor of Politics, Rosie Campbell, who will be looking at how women could influence this election, including you. So get in touch with me. Tell me the important issues for you, the text number 84844 you can also email me by going to our website or drop me a whatsapp or a voice note on 03700 100 444 also on the program today we're talking bling with

Helen Molesworth Helen has written a book all about gems do you have a precious piece of gem encrusted jewelry what is it and what does it mean you? Is it a family heirloom or is it something you bought for yourself? Also, do your children have a smartphone? Primary schools in St Albans want to ban them for under-14s. A school in Ireland is already a year ahead. They did it. I'll be finding out how it's worked out for them. And then, when is a showgirl not a showgirl? When she's a showwoman, of course. Marissa Koneski will be producing an event at the Brighton Festival with 33 women showcasing their thrilling circus skills. So get in touch with me about anything you hear on the programme. The text number, once again, 84844.

But first, as we are now all very much aware, there will be a general election on July the 4th, only six weeks away. Officially, campaigning starts at the end of next week, but already some of the key players are speaking out. But what about women's concerns in this election? As I've already asked you, what matters to you? What do you want to hear being addressed? Many of you are already messaging in, so please continue to do so. And I'll read some of your comments out as I speak to my first guest this morning, Professor Rosie Campbell, Professor

of Politics and Director of the Global Institute for Women's Leadership at King's College London, who's been looking at women's voting behaviour for many years now. So he's the perfect person to speak to us this morning. Welcome, Rosie. Good morning. First of all, were you surprised at the announcement yesterday? Well, I was surprised I think there'd been a lot of briefing that it was going to be in the autumn So yeah, I was taken by surprise

But now I'm feeling pretty excited So as a professor of politics You've said you're excited Do you enjoy the build-up? I mean, this is what got me into politics I love election time I love watching it I mean, I think that makes me quite an unusual person

But yeah, I find it very fun. Go on, what's fun about it? What's fun for you? I think it's like sport, except for everything's at stake. You know, this is really, really important. And it's a time when we all come together to think about the issues we care about. For me, it's fascinating. So let's hone in and focus on women. Now, you've previously said women will decide the next election.

Explain why and how. Well, the reason for saying that is in the last few elections, there's been a real focus on what might have been called working to man, disproportionately men in the kind of former what's been described as red wall seats, so post-industrial areas. Now, those voters are really important. The Conservatives won them from Labour, and the Labour Party wants to win them back. But actually, the pathway for Labour to secure a majority requires them to take different kinds of seats, the traditional bellwether marginal seats,

places like Stevenage. So you might think of Stevenage woman as now being a really key target. And these are disproportionately women who are worried about their economic and their family's economic situation, worried about the NHS, previously voted Conservative, but are undecided potentially now. So who is the average female voter in the UK? Well, I think we've got to be really careful talking about the average female voter because women are as different from each other as men are. And I should caveat that there's more similarity than difference in the way men and women vote. But for the last two elections, there has been this generational difference where

overall women are slightly more likely to vote Labour and men are slightly more likely to vote Conservative. And that's because there's a really big gap in the youngest generations with men being much more likely to vote Conservative and women much more likely to vote Labour. So that's really emerged in the recent years. So are younger women appearing to be drawn in different ways to their male contemporaries? Let's talk about the generational differences. They really do seem to be. It's fascinating to me because, as you said, I've been studying this for a couple of decades.

And the main story used to be that there wasn't much going on. Whereas now we really are seeing this gendered pattern of voting behaviour. And we don't fully understand it. I think if you look at what's happening now, women are disproportionately worried about their own financial and their family's financial situation, and the NHS. And potentially, those are issues that the Labour Party could be ahead on. But it's, that's the competition ground, really, where women's votes can be secured. Now, we've asked our listeners today what their priorities are in this election, and I'm going to be reading some of their messages out in a moment. But what are women telling you within the research?

Well, I'm looking at polling research, so I'm fascinated to hear what your individual voters say. Should we have a look? There's going to be a range of differences. But in the polling, you know, the NHS comes out and the cost of living just comes out over and over again as really key priorities. So we've had, I'm going to read some of these out. I would consider voting for anyone of any party who actually knocked on my door to speak to me. I've been a householder for 57 years and I've yet to see any candidate of any persuasion um i want to see a focus on women's safety on the streets says someone else imogen says the only issue for me under which

all other issues sit is the climate crisis health food security the economy societal integrity all of these are more under threat from climate change what we need is bold visionary policies for a resilient future i'm not sure we'll get them, but I hope so. And Rowena says, why do we not hear about what parties plan to do about smartphones and tech companies?

There are far greater controls in France and other countries than there are in the UK. I'd vote for anyone who will ban smartphones for under-16s. Interestingly, we will be talking about primary schools

in St Albans thinking of doing just that. So they're the sort of some of the messages we've just had in this morning rowena what um what do you think about that hell erosing interesting the point about knocking on doors because you know the way our electoral system works is that we have a lot of what we call safe seats where your votes tend to stack up and you maybe feel like they're not you know they're not making a difference and parties tend to neglect those seats.

So, you know, you can live somewhere for 57 years and hardly see a candidate. And I do think that's problematic. We know that actually having people knock on the doors really engages us in politics and makes us take it more, you know, get more interested. So I think that's a real shame. I think the parties should be actively trying to out there campaigning for all of our votes. Yeah. So let's talk about the campaigning because we've got six weeks. How important are these next six weeks going to be in terms of campaigning and influencing how women vote?

Well, so the campaign is really important and women are more likely to be in the undecided group. They're just as likely to turn up and vote as men, but more likely to have not decided yet. So actually securing those women's votes is going to be a really big part of the campaign for all of the parties. Why do we think that is? I think it's something to do with strength of feeling. I think historically, politics was thought of as being quite a masculine thing. And the more interested you are in something, the more you tend to, you know, if you like football, you know which your football team is. And so women are less likely to have that strong affiliation with a party which means they're more likely to be weighing up actually who is and I think that came across

actually in what the listeners had to say as well they're looking very who's going to offer me the best match to what my priorities are. Yeah they're absolute life priorities interesting one that I thought someone messaged safety how women feel on the streets, big topic of conversation here. And the world has changed so much since 2019. When we had the last election, hasn't it? We've had Me Too, we've had COVID. So it'd be interesting to see how the world has changed completely. It has indeed. I mean, I think when you're looking at polling, it obviously simplifies, it asks you what are the two or three most important issues. The really nice thing about hearing from individuals is you realise the wealth of issues that we really need to tackle. Now, currently, there's about a third of MPs are

female. How important is it to the electorate that these numbers increase? I don't think there are many voters out there who are thinking, I'm going to go and use my vote just on that basis. There are a very small number of women who will vote for a woman just for that reason, because they feel so passionate about it. I think it matters more in terms of party image. You know, we expect to see in the modern world a representative political party looking like our society. And when we see a gap, it makes a party look a bit dated. Now, we had somebody say that they it was important for them to have someone knock on their door but what about generational differences what

do we know about how younger women vote? Well so younger women seem to there seems to be a polarization at least in some issues between younger men and younger women with younger women the listener who talked about the environment you know being a really passionate concern for a lot of younger women um whereas younger men there are lots of young men who care about the environment but slightly fewer than there are young women so there's this divergence that seems to have emerged um and you obviously getting very excited you'll be watching this closely so tell me more about what what you'll be what you'll be looking out for in terms of women well i would really love to see um an emphasis on the issues that we know are really shaping women's lives so you know affordable child care is a massive issue in the uk and

something that disproportionately affects women i would really expect to see the parties talking about that i think this affects men and women, but perhaps disproportionately women because of women taking on more caring work is the issue of social care, you know, which is a massive problem in this country and something that I think so far has had very little attention.

So those are some of the things I'll be looking out for. And I'm sure we'll be talking to you again as this gets going for the next six weeks. But for now, Rosie Campbell, thank you very much for your time. 84844 is the number to text. Something that just came up

in one of your messages was your concern over smartphones and tech. Well, primary school headteachers in St Albans have urged parents to wait until their children are age 14 before they give them a smartphone.

So not before they're in year nine at secondary school. 20 out of 24 of the heads that make up St Albans primary school's consortium have signed a letter sent to parents across the Hertfordshire district this comes almost a year after a group of head teachers in County Wicklow in Ireland took similar action last year we spoke to Rachel Harper the principal of St Patrick's National School in Greystones in County Wicklow. She and seven other headteachers in her town advocated to parents not to allow their children smartphones until they were older

as part of a wider approach focusing on the well-being of children called It Takes a Village. Kim Parris is a parent whose children are aged 9 and 10. Both attend St Patrick's. Kim and Rachel join me now from the school welcome to both of you welcome to Women's Hour um welcome back I should say Rachel I know you spoke to Nuala last year let's talk about how how it's worked out for you a year a year later so what do your what first of all what do you think about St Albans wanting to urge parents to do the same

thing to wait until children are 14 to give them a smartphone look i think it's great the way the initiative has traveled um across our country here in ireland but also internationally across the water and across many different countries and i just think it's fantastic that we're all having this conversation here today a year later and just how much has happened in the last year it's great it's all very positive let's remind everybody listening what the what your initiative was was about because it was called it's called it takes a village it was your idea why did you start it what was the initial idea it takes a village um was initially started due to increased anxiety level here with the children in primary level. And I suppose I could see it in my own school, just at the school gate in the mornings,

just greeting the children and then speaking to parents and parents just expressing what's happening at home. And then speaking with the teachers themselves. And just we could all kind of just see an increased anxiety levels around the age of 9, 10, 11 year olds and that led me then to reach out to the other schools in the area just to see if they were seeing something similar themselves and they were. So we came together as a group of eight principals to try and see was there something that we could do working together. So the first stage I just sent out questionnaires to all the principals, teachers, SNAs and parents in the area because I think we all see things differently with a number of questions but what really struck me was that 100% of the principals in the area could see an

increase in anxiety levels in their own school, 95% of teachers could see an increase in anxiety levels in their own classes and then 56% of the parents could see an increased anxiety levels in their own classes and and then 56 percent of the parents have been increasing anxiety levels in their own children and over 850 parents filled out the questionnaire so with those results coming back to you think gosh there must be more that we can do so we came together as a time and as a group of schools and we started to look at different well-being initiatives that we can bring in to our eight schools. And one of them was working together, all eight of us bringing in this voluntary smart code.

And I have to say it worked out really well for us. The first stage was we sent out a letter, a letter that we all sent out the same letter in our schools. And then I got everybody to send me just a scanning of their signature so we put that at the bottom of the letter and I suppose if you saw a letter coming out from my school you think oh Ms Harper's been really strict but when you got to that you saw that you know all the other principals in the area were signing this letter so there must be more to it and I suppose launching it together then there was a lot more strength in that because it got

everybody talking in the area about it are you signing up and I know you said lots of other schools have been in touch and now we're hearing about St Albans wanting to do a similar thing but how has it worked out for you a year on a year on look it's been very positive because you know chatting to the parents themselves they feel a lot more supported if they want to make this decision for their child you know um and i suppose there for a while things were escalating for us and we're getting out of hand you know and smartphones are creeping in at a much earlier age and that's why the grid principles we said look we need to try and do something now together before the age starts getting younger and younger so i suppose that whole taboo subject

the parents then started to open up and to talk about their concerns that maybe they weren't expressing before for fear of being the overprotective parent or a parent that might be judging another parent that might have got a phone for their child so it just opened up the conversation around smartphones and just social media so I think that was really positive for us and I suppose then as I said parents felt supportive this was a decision they wanted to make but also for for the kids themselves, you know, that they no longer felt that they were the only one with strict parents that was holding off getting a phone that, you know, they feel that they're the same as everybody else. There's a sense of fairness there for them, that okay, they might like the decision,

but if everything's the same, they feel better about it. So you kind of made it easier for parents to make that choice and so and for the children as well so they're not they don't feel like they're the only one and they're being left out because it's just blanket for everybody but what about their anxiety levels what have you seen anything change in the year yeah i mean i do find like our current sixth class last year would have all had smartphones so you know that definitely the majority in sixth class wouldn't have the smartphone so there's no pressure there with the whatsapp groups and trying to to keep up with the

whatsapp groups you know and i suppose children now are going to each other's houses and i suppose you know for playdates and things like that and meeting up and parents are now saying that it's a phone free playdate you know or um meet up because now they have the confidence to say actually you know what we don't bring phones here uh so there's lots of little kind of ripple effects you know that you know kids are certainly seeing that it's more fun to be interactive face to face rather than meeting up and scrolling on the phone you know so that's what we see kind of down the senior end. And down the junior end, I suppose what we see is we've created a new norm here.

You know, I was laughing at one of the infants that said to their mum, Mum, will I be able to get a phone when I'm 20? Maybe. We'll see. You know. Well, it's Justine um elbourne cloud who's co-chair of the st albans primary schools consortium is quoted as saying there will always be parents who don't agree for whatever reason we're trying to change the culture and we're trying to change the expected norms so

i want to bring kim in on this because kim you're a parent um what is the culture amongst parents and what did you feel about the idea of banning phones how did you react to it we can't really hear you kim maybe we need to get sorry there we go you're sitting next to each other that's lovely there we go we can hear you now and I am 100 behind it and I have a nine and ten year old my nine year old boy would not be so much of an issue but my ten year old girl who'll be 11 and older and she's been talking about a phone for at least two or three years because as soon as one child in the class gets one it becomes the you know now i want one and so i mean the what the best thing about the take the village is that it's i suppose like nearly like a herd mentality if nobody has

one they don't look for it or if it's the vast minority that have them. But I think that the phones are hugely detrimental socially for our children. Hugely. So how do you deal with it? I mean, is your daughter quite demanding? Does she want it? Are there tantrums? How as a parent do you cope when your child already is used to it and then other kids? Because your children are the experiment really, aren't they?

And so there will be kids who are already online and have smartphones. And if you're the parent saying, well, you, you can't. Yeah. And I'm there. I'm there because the likes of various online games and things, we don't do that. We, we, she just has to get on with it sort of thing. You know, like I mentioned, she's involved in every other aspect. You know, like she does lots of extra curriculars. She's more friends than you can possibly imagine. You just have to. I won't

bend on this one thing and she's completely accepted that now. She's very much thinking the second she goes into secondary school, she's getting a smartphone. And is she? I'm going to cross that bridge at the time, but to be honest, with it taking the village coming in, I'm hoping I can kick that can down the road. There's nothing to say that she won't have a phone for texting and calling, but it doesn't need to be a smartphone.

I don't think that there's a requirement for a 12-year what what about um kim parents um and if you could just angle that laptop a little bit towards you a little bit more so you're right in front of the microphone that's perfect thank you what about what would you say to parents who say that their children need one for safety or a mobile phone i don't know the difference i don't understand the difference like if they're the safety aspect to me is the child is now out you know out on the road playing or out because my kids now we live in a tiny village and they would now go out and play with their friends out on the local tennis courts and things and they only need communication by call or text they don't need a smartphone for that so i don't understand the safety aspect.

So get themselves, would an old brick phone appeal? Absolutely. Absolutely. My kids have those little smart watches things that they take. They can take photos, which they love, and they can just call and text

whenever they need. Rachel, how might you advise the headteachers at St Albans? My advice to the headteachers at St Albans? My advice to the headteachers will be to keep the conversation going, to keep talking about it. I know here with It Takes a Village, we have monthly parent workshops and we try and build quite a bit about the smartphones and quite a bit about social media. So getting parents to talk and to open up. And at the end of these talks, then we would bit about social media. So getting parents to talk and to open up. And at the end of these talks, then we would have questions and answers.

So the parents feel like they have a voice and they can express their concerns and ask questions. Exactly what we're talking about there. You know, what do you do if your child is really demanding a phone or what do you do? And I think that's really healthy. I think that everybody keeps talking. And again, not to forget the children is to keep talking to the children as well you know about why we're doing this for them and and you know the huge benefits that it's gonna have for children and in years to come um

and to keep them engaged and i suppose another thing really is it's not about you know that we're trying to take things away from the children. We're trying to add more to the children's childhood, you know. And as Kim said there, it's about getting them out, doing extracurricular, getting out in the green, meeting their friends face-to-face, you know, doing childlike things. And I think that's really important to express to children that it's something positive we're really

doing this for their benefit that's a very good spin on it that's very clever isn't it we're not taking anything away from you we are adding to your childhood um but what about the parents who might have resisted it how do you convince them that this is a you're helping them because for a lot of parents they are they they help them out when they're busy mobile phones can take children away and you know they may be again maybe they see them as a safety uh that they can contact their children whenever they want and vice versa so how do you how did you convince those parents or didn't you i think here in ireland it's a voluntary code at present you know so the parents always had the choice there so there was no blanket ban and i think the parents always had the choice there. So there was no blanket ban. And I think the parents liked that,

that they felt, you know, that they were in control, that they could make this, you know, personal choice for their family situation. So that kind of stopped a lot of resistance, you know, and I suppose our job then was really to express the parents the benefits for why we're asking them to hold off and to wait to get a smartphone for their child for secondary school.

And so I think that kind of has a lot of weight. And again, you know, there's a lot of answers there and it's not locking down or it's not judging anybody, you know, so I think the parents feel free to come and talk to them about this. And as Kim was saying there, you know, there's plenty of other options, you know, if you feel your child, and we do realize that about nine, 10, you know, probably 10 of other options you know if you feel your child and we do realize about 9

10 you know probably 10 11 12 they start going and a little bit more independent whether they're going to grandparents house in the afternoon different things like that and parents feel that they need to have something on them that they can be contactable with but i i think just a normal phone you know like you were saying the block phone there where you can just call and text that's suffice for children and primary I really feel um so there's plenty of other ways around it I think it's about being creative um and it's about rethinking how we can do things around smartphones you know um uh thank you Rachel thank you Kim for joining me to to talk to me about that it's about being creative it's not about taking away it's about adding to the child's experience of childhood lots of you getting in touch to say in my school around half of nine and ten year olds already have phones someone said

sophia norwich says uh what can we do to enable autonomy in friendships in an age without land lines my 10 year old wants to be able to contact her friends and I want to enable this but we don't have a landline to enable her to them to call each other and that's an interesting one isn't it children need green spaces to play and exercise not concrete jungles of tech just some of the thoughts coming through eight four eight four four is the number to text someone else has said here oh this is about election. I would love to see a party take seriously children's mental health and support smartphone-free childhood and delay smartphone campaigns. Smartphones are being normalised for young children due to both primary and secondary schools allowing them on site.

Primary schools need a total ban and secondary schools must store them in lockers for the whole day if we're to protect children from smartphone harms. Any manifesto including this would definitely get my attention. Are smartphones allowed in schools? Can people take them into classrooms? 84844, your thoughts on all of this, please. More than welcome. Now, my next guest is an Olivier Award winning theatre maker who this weekend is taking over an entire street in Brighton with a show honouring the forgotten women of the circus. Marissa Karneski and a cast of over 33 performers will reveal the lost stories of groundbreaking magicians and sword climbers through their own performances at this year's Brighton Festival. Marissa, welcome to Woman's Hour. Lovely to have you in the studio. Thank you. Lovely to be here.

Karneski's showwoman sideshow spectacular. I have to say it like that. What can we expect? Well, as you said, we're shutting down a street and we've got lots of stages and they're all on at the same time. So you walk into the street. It's like walking into a dream.

It's an immersive promenade outdoor experience with the most extraordinary women performers. So we have the best contemporary women clowns. We have women that walk on glass. We have women that do whip with fire. We have women who hang by their hair. And we have the finest... Ouch. Yes. It's a very old circus skill. We have the finest collection of women wrestlers in Britain. So you walk in and you see all these women performing simultaneously. So it's not like going to a cabaret club or a circus in a big top. It's the sideshow tradition. So all the stages

are going off at the same time and they're all performing these amazing skills. Our company is completely diverse. We're all different, but we are all celebrating these rare, extraordinary circus skills that were kind of, in a way, lost to time. seaside entertainment, variety, working class British culture. And we're bringing it all back to life. So we say we are channeling the ghosts of the women that came before us. Oh, I like that. And presumably a lot of these women, well, do they all know each other? Is there a community of women who perform around the country?

Or is this the first time this is happening? So we are the biggest gathering of women that do this. We do all know each other. We are a community. And we are very much show women, not show girls. Yeah, what's the difference? So the point is, I guess, when we think of show girls, we think of a woman in a lineup of other women, and they're all identical. And that's the popular term in culture that we have for extraordinary spectacular performing women but i'm making the case based on my research at the national circus and fairground archive that um we are not show girls that there's a

whole new generation of women they are their own boss they get their own skills. They have extraordinary bravado and flair. They do amazing things. They're show women. They're not girls. And so we're bringing this term into the vernacular because traditionally there is a term called, you know, we're more than showgirls. We are not just the woman that runs the circus. We are the woman that does the extraordinary performance. There's power. There's power in the word. Like a showman. Yeah, there's power in the word woman, isn't there? And you spell it with an X.

So we spell it with an X because our group of women are all different. And some of us are women that identify with the word woman in the traditional spelling. And some of us are women that are exploring gender and identity and exploring non-binary identities. So they are non-binary people as opposed to using the traditional woman word. And I think we want to just be inclusive of everybody. And you are highlighting the women who have come before you in this field. First of all, before we talk about some of them, why don't we know their names? Well, I think this is interesting. So lots of books and films are written about great showmen.

And we, you know, we use the term showman across the culture to just say anybody that's a bit spectacular. But there were women in the 1930s and long before that, that did amazing things. But somehow they were written out of history. And very importantly, we are rewriting herstory. So they were not the topics of novels and films. A lot of culture is men's stories. And it's very much time to bring women's stories out. So there was an amazing woman in the 1930s called Koringa who was a big star in her day, but because war broke out and she was kind of pre-television, she kind of got forgotten about in a way.

Who was Koringa? What did she do? So she climbed a ladder of swords and she hypnotised crocodiles. Of course. She laid on a bed of nails and had a concrete block broken over her stomach. And she did all these extraordinary things. She was reputedly the highest paid star of the Bertram Mills Circus. But also, apparently, and we don't know if this was her publicity or if this is true, but she was a bit of an activist and she worked for the French Resistance. And the story goes that what she did for the French Resistance was hypnotise farm animals on enemy lines

so that soldiers could cross at night. What a brilliant story. I'm just wondering about Koringa and actually the women that you have performing with you at the Brighton Festival and just what it takes to step out and become a show woman because you know we often say we're going to run away with the circus it's seen as something you do to step away from society to do something that's different and other yes what does it say about their characters well I think bizarrely we're very much entrenched in culture and we haven't been able to

run away i think we have to be very present and um you know we do we look at the idea of what otherness is and and you know we have a we have all original painted fairground signs so painted by a fairground artist called dave pop not a woman but um but they have all my feminist slogans on and and slogans that we've developed in dialogue with the cast so one of the slogans is otherness is mine so we are reclaiming the exotic we are decolonizing the exotic we are claiming otherness um i've forgotten your questions. No, no, you've answered it. You've answered it. You've not, but you've answered it.

Back to some of the spectacle in the show, Karinga, who climbed a ladder of swords, how much of it is an illusion? And I know we don't want you to give it away completely, but how much of it is real? So the performers in our show have real skills and they're really doing it. So we have an amazing woman called Jackie Lee who hangs by her hair. She is really hanging by her hair.

We have an amazing woman called Lucy Fire who whips fire. She has whips that are on fire. They are really on fire. We have an amazing woman coming from Paris called Lalamorte who walks on broken glass. She's really walking on broken glass. And they are highly trained professionals and we must not try this at home. No and interestingly the show is for all the family. We're very careful about the way we present the work. They are, when you go to see a trapeze artist in the circus, whether they're hanging by their hair or by their hands, obviously we don't do this at home.

So it's spectacle. It's showwomanly spectacle. The performers are trained for many years and they perform all over the world. And there's lots of things that you absolutely should not try at home. Can we talk a bit about the aerialist, Miss Lala? Yes. Who was she? So she was an amazing aerialist that was painted by Degas in the 18th century. So there's a very famous painting by Degas called Miss Lala at the Circus Fernando and she is doing the iron jaw which means she's

hanging by her teeth. So her whole body is in the air hanging by her teeth. It's one of the most famous circus paintings of all time but it is only recently that it has come to popular attention that this woman was not a white woman. So she was a black woman that hung by her teeth. She was a huge circus sensation. Her name was Miss L um but she had to bill herself with names like olga the mulatto in the popular consciousness she had to be seen as um

exotic with quite racist terms and we're celebrating her today um and reclaiming her as a heroine of the circus and looking at women like her now who are in our cast, who are channeling her greatness. Well, yeah, and like you say, you know, not only is it women's stories taken away and not part of the popular consciousness, they're whitewashed as well. Completely. So I would say from my research

that um the british seaside was a melting pot that there were women from all different cultural heritages and it wasn't just all nice well not nice i don't mean nice but it wasn't all white women and i think unfortunately we've come to think of British culture as this kind of very white thing from perhaps wartime and it wasn't so seaside and British seaside has always been a place where we celebrate cultural difference and cultural diversity for sure. Miss Lala's going to feature on our Monday bank holiday special program which the entire hour is dedicated to muses wow so she will be featuring on that. Where did your interest come from?

Well, I've always been interested in popular performance. And, you know, I trained in ballet, but I loved cabaret. I was taken by films like Cabaret when I was a child. And I wanted to be that kind of performer. And it didn't really exist when I was in the 90s, in the late 80s, when I was emerging as an artist. Stand-up comedy and cabaret was, you know, a bloke in a T-shirt doing stand-up. And I think there was a whole generation of women that wanted to reinvent cabaret.

Circus skills started to become something you could train in. You didn't have to be born into circus to train. So amazing circus schools started opening up around the country and I always wanted to be a performer that could do everything I didn't want to choose so I in fact recently started a degree for people that want to do this at Rose Bruford College where you can study popular and contemporary performance. Because I don't think that we celebrate the traditions of popular performance that we have here in the UK enough. We don't celebrate working class entertainment traditions like magic, like circus. There's also the weird and the wonderful and the slightly eccentric.

And also there's a real sense of empowerment when you see women doing something so thrilling. Yes. And owning all of themselves, you know women doing something so thrilling yes and owning all of themselves you know doing something that terrifying um yeah i can't i'm i'm just i'm thrilled at the idea of it i think it's going to be a very powerful day with 33 of you together performing thank you very much yes we it's it's so demanding we do it for seven it's an hour show seven hours a day at brighter festival that we actually have two casts. So and the cast doing completely different things.

So we have one set of women. They do a couple of hours and then we have another set of them. So you can come twice because you'll see a different thing every time. Fantastic. Such a pleasure speaking to you. And Kaneski's show women's sideshow spectacular will run as part of Brighton Festival on the 25th and the 26th of May. Marisa, thank you very much. Thank you so much.

Now, it was confirmed yesterday that a Chinese blogger who was jailed for four years for her reporting on the first COVID outbreak in Wuhan has been released from prison. The media watchdog Reporters Without Borders shared a video showing the blogger Zhang Zhan saying she'd been released on schedule and thanking everyone for their concern. The former lawyer was jailed after she traveled to Wuhan to document the outbreak in a series of widely shared online videos. She was due to be freed last week, but friends and supporters were concerned when they were unable to contact her. Reporters Without Borders say that Ms. Zhan's freedom is still extremely limited. To get more on this now, we'll speak to The Guardian's senior China correspondent, Amy Hawkins, who's been following the story.

Amy, welcome to Woman's Hour. Firstly, can you tell us a bit about Zhan and how she ended up in prison? Yeah, so she was originally a lawyer from um i think shanxi province and she kind of in recent years before the pandemic had turned towards activism um and was quite deeply involved with the activist communities um also christian communities in china which are under a lot of pressure and when the covid pandemic broke out in Wuhan at the end of 2019, early 2020, she traveled there by herself and started broadcasting on Chinese social media and also Western social media videos and reports about the scale of the lockdown there, videos of some hospitals overflowing, train stations shut down, and the fact that there was a strict limit on people's expression and what they're allowed to say about the lockdown as well as on their movements. Yeah, she was imprisoned for picking quarrels and provoking trouble, which is reported to

be a frequent charge against activists in China. What does that actually mean? Yeah, it's this quite like vaguely worded charge that, like you say, is often used against activists or anyone who kind of criticizes the government or causes trouble for the authorities. So she was arrested in May 2020 and charged with that crime you know tried to have a 99% conviction rate. She was convicted in December of that year and sentenced to four years in prison and it's yeah kind of a catch-all term for anyone who is causing trouble for the government.

What do we know about how she was treated in prison? So information is always quite limited from Chinese prisons. One of her original lawyers was struck off after representing her. But we do know that she went on a hunger strike at least once. She was hospitalized at one point. Her former lawyer visited her and saw her with a tube up her nose, I do know that she went on hunger strike at least once. She was hospitalized at one point. Her former lawyer visited her and saw her with a tube up her nose, which was thought to have been used for force feeding.

In one of her court appearances, she was in a wheelchair. She'd been seen at other points with her hands tied. And so there were lots of concerns about her health. And she lost a lot of weight, although seemed to have regained it before her release. And she was due to be freed last week, but friends and supporters were concerned that they weren't able to contact her. Do you know what happened? So it's hard to say exactly what happened, but like you say, ahead of her release,

there were a lot of concerns that her friends and family in China were under pressure not to talk to anyone outside China and share news. It seemed that she was released on her scheduled date of May 30, although it's hardly confirmed that exactly. But there are widespread concerns that she's not got her full freedom. What often happens to activists is they're released, but kept under close surveillance, maybe limits based on their travel and their movements.

And there still has been you know very limited contact with the outside world after her release other than this video that you mentioned. So where is she now? What do we know? So we think she's in Shanghai. She said in the video that she was she'd been released to her brother's apartment in Shanghai which is where she was living before but even that you know it's hard to kind of independently verify that and um the video itself you know it's just in the hallway of an apartment building it kind of could be anywhere and what's the reaction been in china to her release do people there generally know who she is um very muted i mean it won't be in any kind of it's not in any chinese media reports or anything

like that i think people who follow the human rights community or who are particularly interested in the treatment of citizen journalists and have access to um vpns which can allow them to access foreign websites um and foreign news sources might be aware of it but it's definitely being managed in such a way to try and keep it as quiet as possible um thank you very much for that that's amy hawkins the guardians senior china correspondent lots of you getting in touch with me about various things you're hearing on the program we were talking about the election um at the start of the show and someone has said my serious concern apart from the important issues of the nhs education and the economy

which i would expect any political party to be concerned about is the status of women with regard to gender self-identification how will the next government safeguard women's rights safe spaces participation in sports and someone else has said here chantal has been in search hello chantal to say child poverty should be high on everyone's agenda it leads to so many societal problems and is utterly miserable for the children it's an abomination that it happens in our first world uh country and on telephones um lots of you have been getting in touch saying um listening to your discussion about smartphones and children parents need to realize that it's not a phone it's a pocket-sized computer with all the access to things that a computer brings you wouldn't let

a stranger into your child's bedroom, but that is exactly what you're doing when you leave them alone with a small computer in their pockets. Thank you for that, Nicola. Keep your thoughts coming through. We also have a statement here that I need to read out

from the Embassy of the People's Republic of China. It's provided as this, saying, China upholds the rule of law and people's lawful rights and interests are duly protected. We firmly oppose any interference by external forces in China's judicial sovereignty. That text number, once again, 84844. Now, gemologist, great word.

Helen Molesworth is the senior jewellery curator at the V&A in London and Professor of Jewellery at the Geneva University of Art and Design. In her new book, Precious, The History and Mystery of Gems, she explores the geology, symbolism, social significance and history of gemstones through some of their famous owners and those that have courted controversy, from the King of Gems, the Ruby, to diamonds, sapphires and pearls, known as the Queen of Gems. Soy, to diamonds, sapphires and pearls, known as the queen of gems. So why are we so fascinated by them? Helen, welcome to Woman's Hour.

Thank you. I'm delighted to be here, Anita. It's really great to have you here. As a lover of bling. I love bling. Who doesn't? Exactly. Why are we so fascinated by gemstones? Oh, I think the simple answer to that is they bring joy, don't they? They make us happy.

And one of the things I've always noticed is the light and the colour. You know, light is such an important part to us, for humanity. It's the centre of so many religions, but also the happiness it brings us. And I can remember a story when I was little, when I was six, the first time somebody produced a gem for me. It was my godfather in the back garden of his house. And it was an amethyst geode. And he showed me this purple collection of sparkling crystals. And it was like someone had put the whole universe into my hand. The colour, the brightness, the light.

I think it gives us an insight somehow into that microcrystalline world. But it tells us huge stories about ourselves and the world. Anyway, my godfather took this crystal away and hid it because I wouldn't let go. And I scrambled after it. He'd hid it on a high dry stone wall, which I climbed up, pulled down and broke my leg. And I have been in love with gems ever since.

Oh, you were obviously fascinated by them, weren't you? And it's the story of humanity. There are ups and downs. And, you know, I write about how it changes the course of history in my book, Precious, which is out today. It's very exciting. And they're a history of humanity. They tell us about people and our love of things and the way we chase them, about power, politics, propaganda, about finance. And you can be digging in the dirt or trying on tiaras the next moment.

Well, let's talk about some of the main ones, some of the main players through history then. I mean, each chapter is based around a different type of gem. So we'll talk about emeralds first. Oh, lovely. You talk about, yes. My first chapter. Yeah, they were favoured by the Indian Mughals, but they didn't come from India. No, that's a fascinating.

So they tell us about the trade and the sort of the trade routes and politics of the 15th and 16th centuries. So the main, main emerald deposits still today are in Colombia. And they were not obviously brought over to the West until the 16th century and the Spanish conquistadors brought them back with gold. And they have made their way into treasuries all over the world from the Iranian treasuries that came out of the Indian treasuries and the Mughals. And today they're beloved the world over. And there's a very lovely story. The very first section of my book, In Precious, I talk about the discovery of one of the earliest emeralds that was hidden under the floorboards in the house in East London.

And it's now part of the Cheapside Hoard. It was an enormous emerald crystal that was buried under the floorboards probably during the fire of London or the plague and it was rediscovered in 1912 and I was very lucky to be asked to see it when it was put on display. You are lucky because you get to see a lot of these gemstones

and I was particularly interested in you getting to have a look at Princess Margaret's collection. You were invited to... So lucky. Yeah. Yeah. I was working at Christie's at the time in London

and I just got a phone call one morning from the head of jewellery who said, you're good at research. I was in my 20s still. I want you to do the valuation, he said. And I think within a few days I was on my way to Kensington Palace and I don't think I really understood until we were driving how nervous I was till we got there. And as I arrived with a colleague, boxes were handed to us across the kitchen table.

And we started opening these amazing jewels. And it was one of those moments where you realise how blessed you are to see a collection of royalty. Yeah. You know, they were the personal collection of the sister of the Queen of England, but they were a personal collection. So what did they tell us about her? Oh, they told us so much. I mean, you could see a very powerful personality. The main piece was the Baltimore tiara, which she had bought for herself. Well, this is what I'm fascinated in. For a woman who didn't have to purchase any jewelry,

she had enough that was going to come to her or was given to her. I mean, centuries and centuries, her family had done all right going to come to her or was given to her in centuries and centuries. Her family had done all right when it comes to jewellery. But she chose to buy this tiara herself. What does that tell us about her? I think it shows a very independent character. And that's one of the lovely things about jewellery. We get to express ourselves with it.

But like you said, she could have borrowed a tiara from her sister, from the Queen. But she went out and she bought this tiara in auction second hand so not only did she have it purchased for herself but she bought it second hand which was also unheard of she even wore it before her wedding and that also it's a sign of a slightly rebellious but powerful woman and I must admit through seeing the collection I just I learned about the person and I saw a woman who was obviously very, she was a granddaughter and a sister. There were little notes in the boxes of pieces of jewellery that said, almost first bit of jewellery given to mum. So her mother, the Queen Mother, had given her little brooches.

She was given a necklace by her grandmother, Queen Mary. And we all have those connections. So you realise that we are all brought together by jewels, whether you are the sister of the queen or just one of us sort of thing. daughters mine and my five grandchildren it sparkles with color and is never taken off very precious and so many people ask about the design and why I'm so proud to wear it I love that I mean wonderful that tells you why gems are so important to us today it's not just about money it's about emotion and they make that connection of love and of romance whether it's between a mother and a daughter or your husband and everyone's seen or received or touched an engagement ring or pearl necklace of a grandmother and this is what precious is about

it's about those connections that we make we don't change as human beings throughout history i wonder what it says about the sort of politics around women being adorned by them um i mean i was thinking about uh engagement rings which which is a tradition that was created by, I mean, you can tell us, created by a jewellery company, De Beers. Absolutely. It was a brilliant marketing tactic in the 40s. And it's, I mean, we're running with it. But the wonderful thing is, do you know who came up with the slogan? A diamond is forever.

It was a woman, which is a wonderful part of the story that sometimes gets overlooked. But, you know, De Beers had one of the biggest deposits of diamonds in the world in South Africa and they had to work out how to sell them. And at that point, not everybody was wearing a diamond engagement ring. And so when Francis Geraghty, I think the name of the copywriter who came up with this slogan, came up with a diamond is forever, they became the go-to for engagement rings. And they sort of, kind of encouraged, what was it,

a third of your wages to be spent or a month's wages to be spent on a diamond. So it's saying, what is your capacity as a man? Yes. And if you look at a woman's finger, it's going to tell you something about the chap she's about to marry. Isn't it? I know. Isn't it? I know. But it's changing today, isn't it? And that's what's so lovely. But you know, you can go back hundreds of years and already see where women are being quite powerful in their own jewellery purchasing. I mean, I think today of us, we buy our own jewellery.

It's changed the market. But I can go back 500 years and you've got people like Elizabeth I who wore pearls. Yes, tell us about the pearls. Well, it's a wonderful story because we think of, you know, women as being maybe weak in leadership and power traditionally, as the narrative has told. Elizabeth I is a great example of a woman that led a whole nation

against another nation successfully. But she put herself forward as the virgin queen and as sort of the leader and the saviour of the country. Pearls were the perfect symbolism of that. Why is that? Because they are white and pure and they come from an oyster, so they seem like they have the virgin birth. But they are also a symbol of maritime power because they come from the sea. So Elizabeth I, she was covered in pearls,

you know we think of her as the pearly queen and she wore them as a symbol to prove that she could beat the Spanish with the Spanish Armada. There's a wonderful portrait of her which is in my book in Precious that shows her decorated with pearls in around 1588 and one very big pearl sort of just below her waist hanging down quite suggestively because it's a symbol of her purity and her virginity but her power and you see the the boats in the background in a window and you realize that this is her taking over the world with pearls and so we've got we've you've given us two really powerful examples of women who have power when it comes down, but they're both royal women. Of course.

Are there times when gems and precious stones are used against women? I'm thinking about dowries. I'm thinking about women being bought and sold. Yeah, I think there are always difficult questions in any kind of industry, whether it's jewelry or anything that makes money. I think historically we don't have as many records as I'd love to have about that, because from a European perspective, it tends to be sort of 15th and 16th centuries. I mean, I can think of one quite good example in France. Well, it was the French gemstone in the 15th century, 14th century.

The Saint-Cy Diamond, which is now in the French crown jewels, was actually bought by the Duke of Milan for his daughter. And so that was the dowry stone. And of course, she was then married off. But when there were fights, and her husband was killed in one of these infighting battles, she was so mad that she took the diamond, sold it, got an army of her own and fought back. And I think that maybe doesn't tell us as much about gems as it does about women. Yes. It tells a story of how we are resourceful, and we will use the things that we have available, whether that is diamonds or pearls or whatever. Some of these famous jewels are surrounded by controversy. I'm thinking of the Koh-i-Noor diamond, which is

currently in the British crown jewels, which tell us a bit about that. Yes. So I write about the Koh-i-Noor in my book, as you know, and it's probably one of the most famous gems, infamous gems today, because it was not worn at the coronation, as it was traditionally would have been expected to by the queen in the queen mother's crown. Why not? Because of the controversy of it having been effectively taken from India in the 19th century and brought, it was taken from an 11-year-old Maharaja and brought to Queen Victoria. And, of course, that has so many difficult stories around it. And it's these signs of how jewellery really can be, diamonds especially, a sign of empire. So they are used in that.

But one of the things I think about when, you know, like I said, there are always bad signs of, there are always bad parts of these stories when we have very valuable objects. And so this diamond was not seen in the crown jewels when it was not at the coronation. But we did actually see the Cullinan diamond, which was worn. It was both in the scepter and the state crown, numbers one and two. This was the biggest diamond ever discovered in 1905 in South Africa. And it has been turned by some as a peace diamond because sort of the flip side to the Koh-i-Noor, this stone was actually bought by the Transvaal government, given to Edward VII and was the beginning of sort of the negotiations for independence. And it was used as a loan so that the money could be got for South Africa for independence.

Isn't that interesting? We know what's going to work. Just give them the big diamond. It always works, doesn't it? The shiny big diamond. How would you say no? But what about, you know, you've visited lots of mines. If we are now purchasing them, it's

very important to know where they're coming from. This is one of the reasons I wrote the book. I really wanted people to see where these things come from, how they have travelled, how they've journeyed across centuries, millennia and countries. And we forget sometimes that it's not just the kings and the queens at the end of the chain that wear them, it's also the people that make them. And I've been down emerald mines in Colombia, I've been up to the ruby mines in

northern Burma, and I spent a lot of time in Sri Lanka going down the sapphire mines. And that's one country which really reminds me the good that's happening in the industry today. Because you see cooperative systems where people are mining and they have an involvement in the discovery of the stones. And it's all done with sustainability and families in mind. Helen, it's been fascinating speaking to you. Not only have you enlightened us about all these precious gems that you've done all this research into, you've also made gemology seem like quite a cool profession to go into. Thank you so much, Helen Molesworth.

And her book, Precious, the History and Mystery of Gems Across Time, is out now. Thanks to all of you who've been taking part. Sorry I didn't get to read all your messages out. I'm back tomorrow from 10 and we'll be casting our gaze at another election, this time the world's largest in India. Do join me then. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. I'm Dr Michael Moseley and I want to let you know about my new immersive BBC Radio 4 podcast series Deep Calm. It's all about how to tap into and activate a remarkable system that we all have hardwired inside of us, our relaxation response. And it's been developed to be listened to at any time you want to really unwind.

We'll discover simple, powerful, scientifically proven techniques to activate this relaxation response and encounter incredible mechanisms that work to help you rest, restore and find stillness. From the breath to the fractal patterns of nature. I hope you'll subscribe on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody.

Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.