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Ursula Burns (Chief Executive) |
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 Ursula M. Burns, born September 20, 1958, currently serves as CEO of Xerox Corporation, named to that position in June 2009, the first African-American woman to head a S&P 100 company. She previously served as president of the company's Business Group Operations, corporate senior vice president, and president.
Burns joined Xerox in 1980 as a mechanical engineering summer intern. She subsequently held several positions in engineering, including product development and planning. In June 1991 she became the executive assistant to Paul Allaire, then Xerox chairman and chief executive officer.
From 1992 through 2000, Burns led several business teams, including the office color and fax business, office network copying business and the departmental business unit. In May 2000, she was named senior vice president, Corporate Strategic Services, and most recently, president of the Document Systems and Solutions Group.
Burns received a bachelor of science degree from Polytechnic Institute of New York University (NYU) in 1980 and a master of science degree in mechanical engineering from Columbia University in 1981. She serves on professional and community boards, including American Express, Boston Scientific, FIRST, National Association of Manufacturers, University of Rochester, the MIT Corporation, the Rochester Business Alliance and the RUMP Group.
Related Links:
Wikipedia
The World’s Most Powerful Women 2009
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Malalai Joya (Politician/Activist) |
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 Malalai Joya, born April 25, 1978, is an Afghan politician who has been called "the bravest woman in Afghanistan." As an elected member of the Wolesi Jirga from Farah province, she has publicly denounced the presence of what she considers warlords and war criminals in the parliament.
In May 2007, Joya was suspended from the parliament on the grounds
that she had insulted fellow representatives in a television interview.
Her suspension, which is currently being appealed, has generated
protest internationally and appeals for her reinstatement have been
signed by high profile writers, intellectuals such as Naomi Klein and Noam Chomsky, and politicians including Members of Parliament from Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy and Spain.
Joya has been compared to the symbol of Burma's democracy movement, Aung San Suu Kyi.
Related links:
Afghanistan's Bravest Woman
Malalai Joya On Wikipedia
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Angela Merkel (Politician/World Leader) |
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 Merkel is the first female Chancellor of Germany. From 2006 to 2009, Forbes Magazine has named her the most powerful woman in the world. In 2007 she became the second woman to chair the G8, after Margaret Thatcher.
Chancellor Merkel is a member of the Council of Women World Leaders,
an International network of current and former women presidents and
prime ministers whose mission is to mobilize the highest-level women
leaders globally for collective action on issues of critical importance
to women and equitable development.
Related Links:
Wikipedia
The World’s Most Powerful Women 2009
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Margaret Moth (Journalist/Camerawoman) |
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 Margaret Moth began her journalism career in her native New Zealand and
joined CNN in 1990. She covered the Persian Gulf War, the rioting that
followed Indira Gandhi's assassination and the civil war in Tbilisi,
Georgia, for CNN before volunteering for the dangerous mission of
filming in Sarajevo.
Soon after arriving in the besieged city, Moth was struck by a
sniper's bullet as she drove with colleagues to the Sarajevo airport to
interview pilots flying relief supplies.
Her jaw was shattered, and she
lost nearly all of her teeth and part of her tongue. Moth was rushed to
a local hospital for emergency surgery and then flown to the United
States where she endured numerous reconstructive surgeries.
After recuperating, Moth returned to her position at CNN.
(Read the written "short" form of the 30-minute CNN documentary here,
but AWR recommends taking a half hour to be inspired by a truly AMAZING woman.
You won't regret it. Guaranteed).
Margaret Moth - CNN Camerawoman - Part 1 of 3
Margaret Moth - CNN Camerawoman - Part 2 of 3
Margaret Moth - CNN Camerawoman - Part 3 of 3
Thanks to Bébhinn Kelly (Hellwafashion) a pioneer in her own right,
for leading AWR to Margaret Moth's story
Related links:
International Women in the News Media
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Shappi (Shaparak) Khorsandi (Comedienne) |
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Shaparak "Shappi" Khorsandi (Persian: شاپرک خرسندی) is an Iranian-born, UK-raised comedian.
She was born in Tehran, but fled to London from post-revolutionary Iran at the age of three and a half with her family, after her father Hadi Khorsandi published a satirical poem perceived as being critical of the revolutionary regime.
Described as a “secular” Iranian Muslim who was raised without any religion, comedienne Khorsandi is reported to have been called an anarchist by her own father.
When confronted by male audiences surprised to see a woman comedienne, she says she explains her presence with: "Some of us get on the stage now without a pole...."
As for the helping people understand the difference between Iran and Iraq, she says: "We're the ones WITH weapons of mass descruction."
Whatever labels anyone else might put on her, and based on the clips I've seen, I can only describe her as being amazingly witty and VERY funny.
One man, interviewed coming out of one of her shows said: “The fact that she can make such fantastic comedy out of horrendous family circumstances, I thought was just amazing. We were sitting there and I thought, I’m not sure I should be laughing at this because it’s just horrible, but she’s got such charm that we just went with it and I thought she was wonderful.”
Here she is at The Apollo:
Related links:
Shappi Khorsandi: The War On Comedy
Shappi Khorsandi on Wikipedia
Thanks to:
Naseem Faqihi
Dubai, UAE
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Aicha Chenna (Women's Rights Activist) |
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 Twenty years ago, Aicha Chenna founded the self-help organization "Solidarité Féminine" to assist single mothers and their children. She recently received the International Women's Club's Elisabeth Norgall Award 2005 in Frankfurt for her work.
Under the auspices of Solidarité Féminine in Casablanca, unmarried mothers run a restaurant, receive further training and offer each other mutual support. | Friends and colleagues affectionately call the enthusiastic Mecca pilgrim "Hajja," while preachers of hate in Morocco's mosques revile her as godless and insinuate that she is fostering prostitutes and infidels.
But Aicha Chenna does not let that stop her: "I have a Muslim heart with a secular mind," is the 64-year-old's quick-witted summation of her own personal credo. And she is determined to continue to fight for the rights of single mothers and their children, as she has done for more than 20 years, although she sees herself more as a conservative.
"I don't know how I would have reacted if my own daughter had become pregnant out of wedlock," she admits with a smile. "But I am against injustice, especially when it comes to children. And that doesn't go only for babies. Many of the mothers I see were themselves abused as children."
Click here to read the full article by:
Martina Sabra
Qantara.de
Translation from German: Jennifer Taylor-Gaida
Related links:
Solidarite Feminine (website/French)
Solidarite Feminine (Facebook page
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Isabel Allende (Writer/Feminist) |
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 Isabel Allende is a master storyteller in the genre of magical realism. Her novels have been translated into 30 languages, and have sold more than 51 million copies worldwide.
Her list of honours, awards and accomplishments is truly staggering. But none of this, according to her, reflects who she is, or what has been important in her life. Rather, she says: “My most significant achievements are not my books, but the love I share with a few people, especially my family, and the ways in which I have tried to help others."
Allende is a beautiful as she is brilliant and witty. She is fiesty, funny and single-minded in her support of women’s issues, as you will see in the TED Talk below.
She was once reportedly fired from a literary translation job for boldly making unauthorized changes to the dialogue of the female characters in the stories she was translating to make the women sound more intelligent, more independent and more charitable than they had originally been portrayed to be.
She was born in Peru in 1942, and lived variously in Chile, Bolivia, Venezuela, Lebanon and parts of Europe before settling in United States. She married twice, and had two children, a girl and a boy. Her daughter Paula Frias, died tragically at the age of 28 after being in a coma resulting from complications of the disease porphyria. Allende wrote her book Paula, a memoir, while caring for her comatose daughter, and later created a charitable foundation in her honour.
In 2006, Allende was one of the eight flag bearers at the Opening Ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, and in 2008, she received the honorary degree Doctor of Humane Letters from San Francisco State University for her "distinguished contributions as a literary artist and humanitarian.”
Watch and listen to her tell tales of passion in a 2007 TED Talk.
Related links:
Isabel Allende Foundation
Wikipedia profile
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