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Top 10 Women Who Changed The World
Top 10 Women Who Changed The World: Women have impacted the world in a very tremendous ways. Their selfless impact in a society ruled by patriarchal dominance has always been celebrated by society.
Women have transformed the world throughout history by being strong, resolute, passionate, and determined to build a better future. While the fight for equality goes on, it’s critical to recall the successes of well-known heroes and identify fresh faces that are having an impact on the globe right now.
To recognise the effort of these wonderful women, we at RNN have compiled a list of the top 10 women who changed the world. Although, it can be worrisome to narrow it down to ten, among the hundreds of women who have really impacted the world.
We believe these few really have a great impact on the world and their resolutions are still been felt. Whether these notable women were scientists, leaders, politicians, or literal giants, they all definitely improved the world. They all dominate their respective fields.
1. Queen Amina
Queen Amina was a famous Hausa Muslim leader in the city-state of Zazzau, which is now Zaria in Kaduna State and was located in what is now the north-western part of Nigeria.
Possibly ruling in the middle of the sixteenth century. Her genuine biography has been largely masked by later legends and folktales, making her a contentious character whose existence has been called into question by several historians.
Amina the queen of Zazzau emerged at a time when men dominated most facets of life. She was a skilled Hausa warrior who oversaw a sizable army that considerably enlarged her dominion by capturing many new lands.
She outperformed her male predecessors in every way as queen. She now stands for the courage and tenacity of womanhood. Most people think of her as the renowned warrior queen.
Amina ruled for 34 years, conquering vast swaths of territory to do so. Additionally, she established trade channels and is credited with starting the production of kola nuts in the region she governed.
Queen Amina may not have ever existed, according to others who claim that her story is a fable. However, there is proof that she does exist. She constructed walls around the important cities she conquered, for instance. Additionally, her former palace and military training grounds still stand in Zaria as structures and ruins.
Despite the fact that she never had children of her own, there are rumours that the direct descendants of her other siblings are still alive and are members of the emirate’s elite governing families.
Although the exact circumstances of her death are still up for debate, it is generally acknowledged that she lost her life in the battle at Atagara, which is located in the modern-day Nigerian state of Kogi.
2. Jane Austen
Jane Austen is also among the top 10 women who changed the world. She was a literary giant with immense influence on British culture. Her six major works, which interpret, critique, and comment on the British landed gentry towards the end of the 18th century, are what made her the English novelist best known.
The dependence of women on marriage in the quest for favourable social standing and financial security is frequently explored in Austen’s stories. Her writings serve as a critique of the 18th-century novels of sensibility and as a precursor to literary realism in the 19th century.
She has won praise from critics and academics for her use of stinging irony, realism, and social commentary.
In her six main works, Jane Austen chronicled life in the late 1700s and early 1800s. Jane Austen began writing while she was barely a teenager. Only four years separated the releases of four of them! That was some incredibly quick writing.
These were Emma, Mansfield Park, Pride and Prejudice, and Sense and Sensibility. Both Northanger Abbey and Persuasion were released after her passing, and they are well-known worldwide. The seventh and last novel was actually written; tragically, she was never able to finish it.
No one was aware of her as a writer while she was alive since she genuinely released her novels under an assumed name. It is generally acknowledged that she was never given the credit she merited prior to her passing.
Just over 200 years after her passing, millions of individuals still carry Jane with them wherever they go. This is due to the fact that her image appeared on the £10 note to symbolize the huge impact her work has had centuries later.
3. Marie Curie: Theory of Radioactivity
Marie Curie is also among the women who changed the world. She was born Maria Salomea Skodowska in Poland and was a pioneering physicist and chemical researcher who later became a naturalized French citizen.
She was the first woman to receive a Nobel Prize, the first and only female recipient of two Nobel Prizes, and the only recipient of awards in two different scientific disciplines.
Marie Curie is renowned for discovering radium and polonium, as well as for making a significant contribution to the development of cancer therapies. She was one of history’s greatest scientists and was the first to examine the Theory of Radioactivity and find that humans could divide an atom.
The first married pair to receive the Nobel Prize, she and her husband Pierre Curie established the Curie family legacy of five Nobel Prizes by sharing her first prize with her.
She was the first female professor at the University of Paris when she was appointed there in 1906. The development of X-rays, which are essential in modern hospitals, was also greatly aided by these findings. It also meant that Curie was able to create a portable X-ray device that could be utilized close to the front lines of war during World War One.
The first research into using radioactive isotopes to treat neoplasms was carried out globally under her guidance. She established two important medical research institutions: the Curie Institute in Paris in 1920 and the Curie Institute in Warsaw in 1932. She created mobile radiography devices to offer X-ray services to field hospitals during World War I.
Claudette Colvin is a retired nurse assistant who became a civil rights activist in the United States in the 1950s. She was detained on March 2, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, at the age of 15, after refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus.
This episode took place nine months before the more well-known one, when Rosa Parks, the secretary of the neighbourhood NAACP branch, had a role in inspiring the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott.
The majority of people are aware of Rosa Parks and the 1955 Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott, but few are aware that several other women also refused to give up their seats on the same bus system. No one heard anything more when the majority of the women were discreetly fined.
The first person to really dispute the law was Colvin. Few people are aware that some women refused to give up their seats on the same bus system, while most people are familiar with Parks and the 1955 Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott. The majority of the women were discreetly penalized, and nothing further was heard.
Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice, a new book, is now centred on her life’s work. The majority of people are unaware of Colvin’s involvement in the bus boycotts, according to author Phil Hoose, despite a few articles on her appearing in the Birmingham press and USA Today as well as passing mentions in a few books about the civil rights struggle.
5. Hedy Lamarr: Invented Tech Behind Wi-Fi
Another important woman among the top 10 women who changed the world is Hedy Lamarr. She was an American actress and inventor of Austrian descent. Lamarr, a movie star in Hollywood’s heyday, has been hailed as one of the greatest actresses in cinema history.
Hedy Lamarr was more than just “The Most Beautiful Woman in Film,” as she was frequently referred to. Lamarr was a popular actress of her era thanks to her command of the screen, but she was also a brilliant inventor.
Lamarr, who was mostly self-taught and lacked formal training, experimented with a variety of pastimes and ideas in her free time, including a traffic stoplight and a tablet that would dissolve in water to produce a fizzy beverage. Lamarr admitted that the drink didn’t work out since it tasted like Alka-Seltzer.
She learned that radio-controlled torpedoes had been considered during World War II. Such a torpedo’s guidance system, however, might be jammed by an adversary, throwing it off course.
The possibility was brought up during a conversation she had about it with her friend, the pianist and composer George Antheil, that a frequency-hopping signal would shield the torpedo’s radio guidance system from being traced or jammed. Antheil achieved success by synchronizing a player piano mechanism that was smaller than life with radio signals.
During World War II, they developed a “Secret Communication System” to resist the Nazis, but the U.S. Navy disregarded their recommendations. Other inventors didn’t understand how groundbreaking the work was until years later.
You may thank Lamarr for the smartphone you use today because her communication method served as a forerunner to wireless innovations like Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.
6. Coco Chanel
Coco Chanel was an entrepreneur and fashion designer from France. The founder and namesake of the Chanel company, she is credited with popularizing sporty, casual chic as the feminine standard of style in the years following World War I.
She was a lady who revolutionized the world of fashion, moving from science to becoming one of the most recognizable brands in the industry.
Coco Chanel was the only fashion designer listed on Time Magazine‘s list of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century. A renowned fashion designer, Chanel realized her aesthetic design in jewellery, handbags, and scent, expanding her influence beyond luxury apparel.
The legendary Chanel No. 5 perfume was created by the fashion designer herself, and the interlocking CC monogram has been around since the 1920s.
She pioneered high-end fashion, and her brand now distributes apparel, fragrance, handbags, and watches under the direction of creative director Karl Lagerfeld. Almost a century after its original creation, Chanel No. 5 is still arguably the most well-known fragrance in the entire world!
It’s safe to argue that Chanel made a significant influence because she started out in a single hat shop and is now worth billions of pounds.
7. Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa is also one of the top 10 women who changed the world. She was a Catholic nun of Indian and Albanian descent who started the Missionaries of Charity in 1950. She left for Ireland after eighteen years, followed by India, where she spent the majority of her life. On September 4, 2016, Saint Teresa of Calcutta was declared a saint. Her feast day falls on the anniversary of her passing.
As a Catholic nun who devoted her life to helping the destitute and dying in the slums of Calcutta, now known as Kolkata, Mother Teresa rose to fame during her lifetime.
Because she believed that the lowest of the destitute” lived like animals but died like angels,” she formed the Missionaries of a Charity organization to care for abandoned children.
Mother Teresa was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979, and following her passing, she was declared Saint Teresa. Mother Teresa’s orphanage is where Mari Marcel Thekaekara grew up and first volunteered as a young girl.
She talked to Witness about the encounter, her personal religion, and her thoughts on Mother Teresa’s approaches. Mother Teresa serves as an example of generosity, compassion, and selflessness to the majority of people. She is the light that gives the people experiencing homelessness and poor hope in their bleak lives.
She was known as “The Living Saint,” and has unquestionably had a profound influence on the lives of a great number of individuals. She was an inspiration to many and altered the world in her own unique way.
But it wasn’t an easy path for her. Even though she received criticism and humiliation, she persisted. She persisted in dedicating her entire life to helping the sick, underprivileged, and powerless. She did this while defying expectations, stepping outside of her comfort zone, and teaching us the genuine meaning of compassion.
8. Queen Elizabeth II
Queen Elizabeth II is one of the women who changed the world order. From 6 February 1952 until her passing in 2022, she served as queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth states.
During her lifetime, she served as queen regnant of 32 sovereign nations, and at the time of her passing, she was the ruler of 15 realms. She ruled for 70 years and 214 days, the longest reign ever recorded for a female queen and the longest reign of any British monarch.
Throughout her reign, Queen Elizabeth II remained a continuous presence at an era of immense social, technological and geopolitical development. Anna Whitelock explores an age in which Britain, but not its monarch, altered beyond recognition.
Never before has one monarch’s rule in Britain resulted in such a significant transformation. Unprecedented changes in every aspect of life during the second Elizabethan era defined it, and its impacts were comparable to those of the industrial revolution more than 200 years earlier.
Significant societal, technological, transportation and geopolitical shifts occurred during the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, resulting in the development of what most people would recognize as the contemporary British state today.
The late Queen and her consistent, unwavering presence for more than 70 years were largely responsible for the monarchy’s survival and, in fact, flourishing against this background.
The media underwent a radical transformation in the ensuing 69 years. Today, there are countless terrestrial television stations available, in addition to many more through streaming subscriptions.
9. Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey is also among the top 10 women who have changed the world. She is a television producer, actor, author, talk show host, and philanthropist from the United States. The Oprah Winfrey Show, broadcast from Chicago, ran in national syndication for 25 years, from 1986 to 2001.
Known as the “Queen of All Media,” Oprah Winfrey was once the only black billionaire in the world and the richest African-American of the 20th century. She was occasionally rated as the most powerful woman in the world in 2007.
In 1986, she initially rose to fame on the Oprah Winfrey Show. Before she used her success to launch the Oprah Winfrey Network, it ran for 25 years. She has also donated millions of her own funds and established two of her own foundations as part of her extensive charitable activity.
Winfrey was raised in the inner city of Milwaukee after being born into poverty to a single, adolescent mother in rural Mississippi. She has claimed that she was abused as a child and in her early adolescence. She got pregnant at the age of 14, and her son was born prematurely and died in infancy.
After being transferred to live with Vernon Winfrey, a barber who she refers to as her father, in Nashville, Tennessee, Winfrey found work in radio while still a high school student.
She makes every effort to end child abuse. As a former victim, Winfrey is aware of the harm that abuse causes to children’s lives. She had a significant role in the creation, promotion, and adoption of the National Child Protection Act.
President Clinton approved the Act and signed it into law in 1994. The Act creates a nationwide registry of child abusers to aid in the screening of potential employees by companies and anyone working with children.
A recurring theme in everything Oprah Winfrey does is that people should assume personal responsibility for their lives and work to make the world a better place.
10. Malala Yousafzai
Malala Yousafzai is the last on our list of the top 10 women who changed the world. She is a female education campaigner from Pakistan and the 2014 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. She is the youngest Nobel Prize winner ever, the second Pakistani, and the first Pashtun to do so. She received the award when she was just 17 years old.
After being shot in 2012 for defying Taliban prohibitions on women’s education in her native Pakistan, Malala Yousafzai rose to become a global icon of the struggle for girls’ education.
Malala started blogging anonymously in 2009 about her concerns that her school might be targeted and the rising military presence in her hometown. Malala and her father Ziauddin continued to advocate for the right to education when their identities were made public.
Malala was attacked by the Taliban on October 9, 2012, as she and her friends were walking home from school. The attack was widely condemned. In Pakistan, the National Assembly adopted the country’s first Right to Free and Compulsory Education Bill after receiving more than 2 million signatures on a petition for the right to education.
In order to raise awareness of the social and economic benefits of girls’ education and to give girls the power to demand change, Malala and her father co-founded the Malala Fund in 2013.
She won the youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize in December 2014. To promote the value of girls’ education, Secretary-General António Guterres named Malala a United Nations Messenger of Peace in 2017.
Top 10 Women Who Changed The World
Here are the Top 10 Women Who Changed The World
1. Queen Amina
2. Jane Austen
3. Marie Curie: Theory of Radioactivity
4. Claudette Colvin
5. Hedy Lamarr: Invented Tech Behind Wi-Fi
6. Coco Chanel
7. Mother Teresa
8. Queen Elizabeth II
9. Oprah Winfrey
10. Malala Yousafzai
Conclusion
This list of women who changed the world is merely RNN’s attempt to reflect back on the accomplishments of a few women who have genuinely made their mark on history through outstanding deeds.
Any name not mentioned is not an attempt at downplaying their achievement. However, to celebrate women all over the world and draw inspiration from these wonderful women who we believed to have changed the world immensely. We hope you also enjot it.
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SOURCES: Wikipedia, Britannica, BBC, History.com