Thangamma, about 80 years old, dives in to gather seaweed. Anushree Bhatter for NPR hide caption
Women & Girls : Goats and Soda Women & Girls
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STORIES OF LIFE IN A CHANGING WORLDWomen & Girls
From left to right: Alice Paredes, Sriya Chippalthurty, Liliana Talino and Natalia Perez Morales are Girl Up "teen advisers" who give up their hobbies to help disadvantaged girls and women in their communities. Girl Up hide caption
A patient talks with a nurse at a traveling contraception clinic in Madagascar run by MSI Reproductive Choices, an organization that provides contraception and safe abortion services in 37 countries. The group condemned the overturn of Roe v. Wade and warned that the ruling could stymie abortion access overseas. Samantha Reinders for NPR hide caption
A scene from Midwives: A baby whose face is adorned with thanaka — a kind of sunscreen made from wood bark. POV/EyeSteelFilm hide caption
Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai at the Australian Open tennis championship in Melbourne in 2020. In a social media post on Tuesday, she described her alleged assault ten years ago at the hands of one of the country's most powerful Communist Party officials, Zhang Gaoli. Bai Xue/Xinhua News Agency via Getty Images hide caption
Dr. Saleema Rehman stands outside Holy Family Hospital in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. The Afghan refugee of Turkmen origin has won UNHCR's Nansen Award for her work helping refugee moms and babies in Pakistan. Betsy Joles for NPR hide caption
M. dances at a go-go bar. She was working as a topless dancer — and also as a sex worker — in the tourist city of Pattaya, Thailand, until the bar closed down in January. She decided to return to her hometown to look for work in a different sector. Allison Joyce for NPR hide caption
Volunteers and trainees with the group Bikeygees at a park in Berlin in July. The organization teaches refugee women in Germany how to ride bikes. Trainee Shapol Bakir-Rasoul, a refugee from Iraq, holds up a Bikeygees sign with founder Annette Krüger, right. Behind them in yellow is volunteer Shaha Khalef, a refugee from Iraq. Deborah Amos/NPR hide caption
'A Beautiful Feeling': Refugee Women In Germany Learn The Joy Of Riding Bikes
Alibaba's headquarters in Hangzhou, China. A female employee at the tech company is alleging that she was sexually assaulted by her manager. Long Wei/VCG via Getty Images hide caption
From left: Giovanna Basso, Mofiyin Onanuga, Emma Fetzer and Joanne Lee are teen leaders for the U.N.-sponsored gender equality group Girl Up. They attended Girl Up's virtual conference last week, which featured Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai as a guest speaker. Giovanna Basso, Mofiyin Onanuga, Emma Fetzer, Joanne Lee hide caption
Pooja Sharma (center) and her two daughters, Lata, 14, and Yukti, 12, sit in front of a portrait of Sharma's late husband and the girls' father, Manmohan. He died from COVID-19 in April, leaving Sharma to fend for her family by herself. Pooja Sharma hide caption
Students work on a classroom exercise at a school in Kibera, a poor neighborhood in Nairobi, Kenya. Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
From left: Home cooked food at Srabasti Ghosh's home, ready for delivery. A volunteer delivers food to COVID-19 patients outside their home. Ghosh (right) with a friend who has joined to help. Srabasti Ghosh hide caption
Priyali Sur, 29 weeks pregnant, at home in Delhi on April 30. Boaz Slater Lee hide caption
Shakuntala Thilsted, winner of the 2021 World Food Prize, is one of the world's leading experts on the nutritional benefits of small fish. Finn Thilsted hide caption
Masuma Ahuja, author of Girlhood: Teenagers Around The World In Their Own Voices, set out to document girls' ordinary lives. Kassy Cho hide caption
Field hockey star Sarita Bhise (right) with her mother (far left) and maternal aunt, cleaning onions they've harvested on the family farm. Ananda Bhise hide caption
From left to right: Naomi Ochoa, Crystal Watts and Danielle Demetria East Douglas Watts, Jr., Lacie Freelen and Ariel Britt hide caption
Marissa Tuping, a rural midwife, and Risa Calibuso, right, arrive in Nueva Vizcaya Provincial Hospital on July 21. Calibuso gave birth to her son moments later. Xyza Cruz Bacani For NPR hide caption
Dola Banerjee homeschools her children in New Delhi in August. Jyoti Kapoor/The India Today Group via Getty hide caption
Joan Garcia became pregnant at 14 and gave birth at 15. She and her child travel by raft between the two shacks where they live in Navotas fish port on Manila Bay. Hannah Reyes Morales for NPR hide caption