The project is co-directed by Professor Lauren Rea, IGSD fellow from the School of Languages and Cultures and aims to create new narratives through free educational resources and training to help teachers address gender inequalities in their classrooms. Recently, this impactful project received the Inaugural Knowledge Exchange and Impact Award 2024 in the category of “Outstanding Partnership or Impact in Creativity, Culture, and Society.”
The journey began in 2016 when Professor Lauren Rea started examining the representation of gender roles throughout the history of the Argentine children’s magazine Billiken, under an AHRC Leadership Fellowship. Billiken has published over 5,000 issues in its hundred-year history and has evolved into a multi-platform product influenced by Professor Rea’s research. Her findings revealed a consistent focus on promoting the nation’s founding fathers along with male role models in science and industry, while the contributions of women were notably absent.
To address this imbalance, Lauren partnered with Billiken’s director, Euhen Matarozzo, to create the illustrated children's book "100 Grandes Mujeres Latinoamericanas" (100 Great Latin American Women) in 2019 as the official publication to celebrate Billiken's centenary. This collaborative effort included teachers, designers, illustrators and academics, highlighting the stories of both historical and contemporary women in various fields such as arts, sciences, politics, sports, and environmentalism.
Following the book’s success, Professor Rea secured a UKRI GCRF Collective Fund grant, which facilitated the development of www.grandesmujeres.lat, an online platform launched in 2021. This platform offers over 400 free educational resources for teachers to incorporate gender discussions into their lessons. The creation of this platform involved more than fifty teachers, creative professionals, and researchers from nine different countries. The project’s animated film series gained international acclaim, being selected as a finalist at the prestigious MIPCOM Cannes DiversifyTV awards.
The project's outreach included workshops for teachers in Central America and Argentina. These sessions highlighted the need for teacher training on incorporating gender equality into curricula. In response, Lauren and her team have been working with a teacher network in Guatemala to co-create a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) that offers contextualised didactic strategies and a comprehensive and mediated theoretical framework on gender equality. Thanks to the partnership with Billiken, the course will be made freely available to teachers across the region.
The Great Latin American Women project’s recognition at the Knowledge Exchange and Impact Awards underscores its significant impact. The awards, which received 88 applications across academic categories and 22 in professional services, celebrated 30 finalists and 8 winners. Held on July 2, 2024, at the University of Sheffield, the event honoured the extensive impact of academic research beyond institutional boundaries and underscored the importance of integrating diverse sites of knowledge to address societal challenges.
The Great Latin American Women project is a testament to the power of collaborative efforts between academia, creative industries, and educators. It aims to foster a cultural shift through education, recognising teachers as pivotal agents of change in challenging traditional gender roles. In alignment with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, this initiative is crucial for promoting gender equality in one of the world's most unequal regions, aiming to create fairer societies by fostering collective reflection and new aspirations for future generations.