As well as bringing us International Women’s Day, March is also Women’s History Month. So much of the history we are taught focuses on the male perspective, and the same can be said of many history podcasts. Even when searching for the best women’s history podcasts,  quite often you will be recommended podcasts from the USA, and focused on American history. So for those of you searching for some UK-based women’s history podcasts, we’ve pulled together some shows that look at the history on our doorstep.

History Becomes Her

Who inspires the women making history right now? In History Becomes Her, Mashable journalist Rachel Thompson speaks to some of the women making change today about the women of the past who paved the way for them. Episodes include journalist Zing Tsjeng talking about pirate queens, and Ruth Hunt speaking about Virginia Woolfe and LGBQT+ history. This is also a great one to listen to for the book recommendations to add to your reading list. Listen now >>

Hell Cats

Speaking of pirate queens, a great Audible Original podcast to listen to this month is Hell Cats. It tells the little-known story of history’s most progressive pirates, Anne Bonny and Mary Read. This is a fictionalised version of a true story, so expect adventure on the high seas and an enduring love affair between the women.  This has had great reviews on Audible, with one listener saying “The sound design is like watching a series with your eyes closed”. Listen now on Audible>>

History Cafe

This podcast isn’t exclusively for women’s history, but it has some great episodes that delve into lesser-known parts of British women’s history. In a short series running this month ‘The Secret History of the Suffragettes’, they “peel away the Pankhurst monopoly to reveal something much uglier”. Learn about the WSPU and the terrorist tactics they employed in the name of women’s voting rights.  Listen now >>

Outliers

Another podcast that looks at history from an interesting angle, Outliers is an historic fiction podcast that explores how big events filter down to the people left out of the history books. Made by Historic Royal Palaces, in association with Rusty Quill (who are most popular for making fiction podcast The Magnus Archives and Stellar Firma) each episode has a writer pick a lesser-known person associated with a historical event, and write a monologue from their point of view. I really enjoyed Fresh Sweat and Cloves, where we hear from the widow of Walter Raleigh. Listen now >>

It’s A Continent

This podcast is here to remind us that Africa is a continent, not a country. And as such, there is a lot of history for many of us to unpack. For Women’s History Month, check out some of the episodes devoted to women who have changed their countries. ‘Queen Nzinga: Angola’s Protector’ was made famous by fighting against the slave trade and European influence, whilst ‘Wangari, Kenya’s mother’ tells the story of Wangari Maathai, who was the first Black woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Listen now >>

Same Sh!t, Different Century

In the Women’s March in 2017, three women went viral for dressing as suffragettes and marching with a sign that said “Same Shit, Different Century”. They were Costume Coordinators Amy Trend, Hannah Monkley and Amy Toll, and this is their podcast. Made back in 2018, there are only eight episodes and the first couple are very homemade. But this is a great podcast diving deep into one aspect of history, and it often pops up in lists for offering a different angle on women’s history. Listen now>>

Normal Women

This podcast was created to be released alongside Philippa Gregory’s history book, Normal Women, but it’s not a book podcast but rather a standalone series based on the book premise. The eight-part series doesn’t focus on the normal podcast narrative about the three or four well-known historical heroines. It is a dive into the normal women who we don’t learn about in history, whether they left records or were ‘hidden from history’ in the everyday. Listen now >>

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In January 2015, long-time podcaster Helen Zaltzman – not quite yet a Podcast Champion but on her way to the honour – debuted her second audio project, The Allusionist. “I didn’t know what it would be until I really started it,” Zaltzman told The Guardian* later that year. She just began with the idea that: “There are hundreds of thousands of words in the English language and the combinations of those words and humans using them is almost infinite.”

That’s what each episode of The Allusionist is: a deep-dive into the history behind a word, phrase, dialect or other facet of the English Language (slang and swear words feature often), that has been forgotten now that the term has entered mainstream use.

After eight years of making Answer Me This! along with Olly Mann and Martin Austwick, Zaltzman launched The Allusionist as a solo podcast, with Austwick providing the music. At 131 episodes and counting (Zaltzman releases two or three episodes a month; the latest, Podlingual, came out on February 25th 2021), knowing where to start with the podcast can feel daunting.

The good news is, you can start anywhere! Each episode is self-contained, there are no narrative arcs, and any inter-episode references are clearly signposted. There’s even a Lexicon page on The Allusionist website, where you can choose a word, then find the episode that it appears in.

I’ve chosen these three episodes as the ones I think newbies should begin with – and, I asked Helen Zaltzman herself to comment on my choices. Here they are:

Episode 4 – Detonating the C-Bomb

You’ve got to love a podcast that devotes its fourth episode to the strongest swear word in the English language. But why is it the one that makes people recoil the most? Why is it so much more popular in the UK as opposed to the US, and why does it sound all the morse insulting if you hit the final ‘T’ hard? If, like me, you find yourself lost in these questions, then this episode is a great place for you to begin!

HZ: At this point, I was still learning what the Allusionist was, and how to make it. I hadn’t yet adjusted to having an audience that was not predominantly British but American, as there’s a different attitude to the C-word in the USA that I hadn’t really understood. It’s a lot of listeners’ favourite episode of the show – swearing is always a crowd-pleaser, I have since learned. Listen now >>

Episode 93 – Gossip

Gossip is an absolutely classic Allusionist episode: taking a term that has been unfairly gendered as female – and maligned as a result – then looking at why this has happened. Zaltzman uncovers the history of sexism and behind the term. Men gossip just as much as women, because it’s essential to building social bonds and finding out news in the workplace, but they don’t get the flak for it. Want to know why? Dive into this episode!

HZ: Gossip was an episode that came about because on a whim I looked up the word’s etymology, and found it to be very different to what I expected – I love it when that happens, Step Away is another episode like that, and the pieces about ‘bulldozer’, ‘lemur’ and ‘copper’. Although the history of the word is what piqued my interest, the main narrative of the episode is more about how the word has been twisted to dismiss something as trivial and feminine, even though gossip is actually really important, socially and culturally. Listen now >>

Episode 99 – Polari

This is an unexpectedly emotional episode, as Zaltzman digs down into a culture and a dialect that emerged in the late 1800s, in response to strict laws against homosexuality, but fell out of use once those laws were neutralised by the Sexual Offences Act 1967. It’s a reminder that our language not only carries history in its syllables, but also the creativity of those who refused to be silenced. The Polari words mentioned so familiar – they’re very much in mainstream use today.

HZ: Some of the most interesting and complex topics on the show are about LGBTQ+ words, and language of oppressed people. Polari covered both. Quite a few Polari words have entered popular vernacular but I wonder if people even know they’re saying words from a secret language that gay men used to communicate with each other before homosexuality was legal. Listen now >>

Listen to The Allusionist on ACAST, SPOTIFY and all other podcast apps.

*That 2015 Guardian piece suggests starting with these three episodes, confirming the legendary status of the Detonating the C-Bomb episode: PortmanNO, C-Bomb, Bosom Holder.

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With inspiration taken from the work and stories that have come from Switchboard, an LGBT+ helpline that’s been in operation since 1974, The Log Books podcast has had quite an auspicious start. Natasha Walker, co-chair at Switchboard and producer of The Log Books, chats to us once again about re-opening the Logbooks for season 2 of the show.

So, what’s it been like making the podcast?

We absolutely loved working on The Log Books podcast. It was a rollercoaster of emotions, reading and listening to all these amazing stories and memories. We have all learnt so much about LGBTQ+ history, which is of course our history with all three of us (Producers – Tash, Adam and Shivani) identifying as LGBTQ+. I think it would be fair to say that this is one of the best things we have ever worked on and Season Two has been even better! We started as colleagues but are now the best of friends!

From left to right, Shivani Dave, Tash Walker and Adam Smith from The Log Books podcast celebrating their British Podcast Awards win.

It may not have been a surprise to many of us – but it did prove to be a shock for the team – The Log Books won Best New Podcast at the British Podcast Awards.

It was so amazing! We were completely overwhelmed and not expecting it at all, when they announced we had won and then the doorbell rang we just didn’t know what to do. It felt so amazing to win the Best New Podcast 2020 award not only because we are all independent podcasters and freelancers, but also because we are sharing LGBTQ+ history, which is so often ignored and untold. To have the podcast recognised as the Best New Podcast of 2020 meant so much to us and shows a really positive shift in society – this isn’t just Britain’s LGBTQ+ history, it’s Britain’s history full stop.

Can you give us a bit of a recap of what the podcast is about and what’s in the first season?

The Log Books is a podcast all about the history of LGBTQ+ life in Britain as noted by volunteers at the helpline Switchboard. Each episode centres around log book entries made by the volunteers who staffed the phones from the charity’s very first day. As a helpline for anyone who wants to talk about gender identity and sexuality, Switchboard has been hearing about, and helping, queer life since 1974. We have spoken to over 50 contributors for the podcast, who have memories and lived experiences of the themes we cover. Season One covered 1974 to 1982, with stories ranging from police entrapping gay men meeting for sex in toilets, to women losing custody of their children for being lesbians, to people kicked out of pubs for wearing pro-gay badges and those struggling with their gender identity before anyone had the right language to help them.

The log books laugh and cry with the real lives of runaways and disco-dancers, with isolated fishermen phoning to chat and people unsure about how to have sex.

The first Switchboard log book – photo by Imogen Forte, Switchboard’s Archive at Bishopsgate Institute

Given the subject matter, there may have been an inevitability to a second season. Thankfully we do have one! What can we hear in this much awaited second season?

Season Two runs through the years 1983 to 1991 and takes up eleven episodes, including a three-part series focusing on the HIV/AIDS crisis. As the country was gripped by growing HIV infections, calls to Switchboard reached unprecedented volumes and intensity. The log books at Switchboard are a unique chronicle of this major health crisis — containing stories from those years that have never been told before.

In this season you hear interviews with patients and healthcare professionals, such as Leigh, a young gay man who began caring for people with AIDS-defining illnesses as soon as he started to work as a nurse.

Also, long-term survivors with difficult but uplifting stories, such as the life-affirming wisdom of George who has spent 35 years trying to keep his infection at bay by calling it ‘sleeping dragon’.

A Switchboard volunteer on a call – photo courtesy of Switchboard’s Archive at Bishopsgate Institute

We also have memories of Switchboard volunteers who took the hardest calls and faced down people who did not want to step into the Switchboard offices for fear of ‘catching AIDS’.

But so much more than a health crisis happened from 1983 to 1991. Britain’s LGBTQ+ communities felt more and more under attack from tabloids and social hostility, with Margaret Thatcher’s government capitalising on this by passing legislation that banned the “promotion of homosexuality”. We’ll hear from a young lesbian teacher, Catherine, whose students scratched insults into her car, and others who were watching the Six O’Clock News when lesbian activists invaded the BBC studio to call for an end to persecution. Other stories in the season include migration to the UK of people fleeing more homophobic countries, state clampdowns on obscenity including a Customs raid on a bookshop, and how Switchboard volunteers used humour to get through these dark times.

Adam Smith, Shivani Dave, Tash Walker, producers of The Log Book – photo by Imogen Forte

What’s the reaction been like to the podcast, both from audiences and also from you all who work on the show?

It’s been so positive, which means so much to us and it’s wonderful to hear people’s thoughts, see their reviews online and read their messages. We felt a real responsibility to not only share this LGBTQ+ history, but also do justice to all the wonderful contributors we interviewed who shared their memories and all those who have called and volunteered for Switchboard. We wouldn’t be here today because of them, their lives and stories live on in the log books and now in the podcast too.

Like any cause and podcast with a social conscience, finding new audiences is key, so why do we all need to listen and take part in this conversation?

As a society we all have to strive to be better allies, to not make the same mistakes that we have made in the past, to learn to evolve so that we move towards a more equal society for all. Looking back through the log books, we learn so much about how the LGBTQ+ communities have got to where we are today, the discrimination, the victimisation, the love, the support, the strength – it’s all part of who we are today, as queer people, as allies, as people. You have to learn from the past, to understand what community, allyship and support really mean. The stories will make you laugh, cry and some… from sex, to police raids, to censorship – it’s all there!

Find season one and two of The Log Books on Acast, Spotify and wherever you get your podcasts from.

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