Woman's Hour

Catherine wrote to us about the wellness industry. She asks whether its relentless focus on improvement whether through diet, exercise or psychological tools such as mindfulness contributes to yet more pressure, particularly for women, to live the perfect life.At the age of 59 Annie is going back to university. She wants to talk about what she should wear. She's frightened of sticking out like a sore thumb amongst the other students on the course. A personal stylist and a fashion editor are on hand for advice.Listener Sarah wrote to us about her three daughters and the fact that they often receive unwanted attention on the street from teenage boys and men. Has it got worse since she was their age? Listener Joy is single and she's not alone. In the latest UK census 34 per cent of the population in England and Wales describe themselves as single. Yet swathes of society still seem to hold singletons and particularly women in judgement. We explore why.Presenter: Jane Garvey Interviewed guest: Catherine Venabl

This week Woman's Hour is all yours.We've had loads of emails and tweets about what you want us to talk about this week.Today we hear from Heidi who wants us to explore a kind of ADHD which is the Inattentive type and affects girls. Heidi is joined by Dr Céline Ryckaert who explains how and why it can be hard to diagnose in young girls and women. We've also got Marilyn on. Not only is she a regular listener but she's a psychotherapist and new mum. She wants us to discuss what she calls "mummy drinking” which she believes is a problem. We've paired her up with Lucy Rocca, author and founder of Soberistas, a social network for women struggling with alcohol addiction.What's it like to divorce when you're 70? Scary or liberating? Our listener Anne tells us all about it.And how do we bring up sons to be kind and considerate men in the future, especially towards women? How do you encourage them to believe that girls and women have the same rights and opportunities as they do? And what does it really mean to brin

Somaliland’s first midwife, first Foreign Minister and former First Lady, Edna Adan Ismail tells us what galvanised her campaign to end the practice of FGM and why now in her 80s she still works at the hospital she helped to build in her homeland.We discuss the rise and fall of the bonkbuster with the author Lauren Milne Henderson, Maisie Lawrence editor at Bookouture and Sareeta Domingo editor at Mills and Boon. The Composer Errollyn Wallen’s work stretches back four decades, she tells us about her latest work with the BBC Proms. A new orchestral work titled This Frame is Part of the Painting.We talk about the impact of The Country Girls by the Irish author Edna O’Brien. It was banned by the Irish Censorship Board and burned publically in her hometown when it was first published. We hear from Lin Coghlan who has adapted it for radio and from the literary critic Alex Clark.How should you talk about the subject of race and racism to your children? Behavioural Scientist Dr Pragya Agarwal and blogger Freddie Har

The Country Girls by the Irish author Edna O’ Brien was banned by the Irish Censorship Board and burn publically in her hometown when it was first published in the 1960’s. This story of female friendship and the restrictions of rural Irish life for women became a best seller and the first of a trilogy now recognised as an iconic work of twentieth century Irish fiction. BBC Radio 4 is dramatizing all three books and Jenni speaks to Lin Coghlan who has adapted it for radio and the literary critic Alex Clark about the impact of the trilogy and why the description of female friendship and female experience feels contemporary even 50 years after the books were published. For the last two years hundreds of thousands of men, women and children have left their homes in Myanmar and made a perilous journey to refugee camps in Bangladesh. They’re Rohingya Muslims. They have their own language and culture but the government of Myanmar, a Buddhist country, refuses to recognize them. The first exodus began two years a

Award-winning author and former Children’s Laureate Malorie Blackman discusses Crossfire, the new novel in her Noughts and Crosses series, which will also be a BBC TV series starring Stormzy.A family must prove whose parent died first in an extraordinary inheritance battle. That was the situation at the high court this week, which resolved a dispute between two sparring stepsisters. But it is also the plot of Dorothy L Sayer’s much-loved novel The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club. So how did the Mistress of Crime come to predict today’s court battles nearly a century ago? We ask Seona Ford, Chair of the Dorothy L Sayers Society and author, Jill Paton Walsh.Composer Errollyn Wallen’s work stretches back four decades and includes 17 operas, numerous orchestral, choral and chamber works, concertos, as well as award-winning scores for visual media. You might remember her music being featured in the opening ceremony of the London 2012 Paralympic Games. She was made an MBE for her services to music in 2007 and ha

Talking to your kids about race and racism with Dr Pragya Agarwal and Freddie Harrel.

Edna Adan Ismail has spent her life improving women's health in Africa, campaigning to end FGM and becoming Somaliland’s first midwife. She was also its first Foreign Minister and is a former First Lady. She was the daughter of a doctor in Somaliland at a time when educating women was frowned upon. She saw for herself how poor health care, lack of education and superstition had a devastating effect, especially on women. At eight years old she herself went through FGM and it was supported by all the women in her family. That set her on a path to oppose it. Now in her 80s, she still works at the hospital she helped to build after retiring from the World Health Organisation. Her story: A Woman of Firsts was recently serialised for BBC Radio 4 and is available on the BBC Sounds App.

Talking to your kids about race. The UK is currently facing a shortage of hormone replacement therapy (HRT). What should you do if your normal supply of HRT tablets, skin patches or gels is unavailable? We hear from GP & menopause specialist Dr Hannah Short.Plus Jane Garvey visits Kitty's Launderette in Anfield which provides much needed washing facilities in one of Liverpool's most deprived areas. And we ask; Why have so called "bonkbuster" novels fallen out of favour with women - and look at what's taken their place.Presenter Jane Garvey Producer Beverley PurcellGuest; Freddie Harrel Guest; Dr Pragya Agarwal Guest; Lauren Milne Henderson Guest; Maisie Lawrence Guest; Sareeta Domingo

Today’s programme is dedicated to the challenges and joys of the long summer weeks out of school. Is boredom good? Will children fall behind on their learning? How can you be sure your teenagers are safe while you’re at work? Jane also hears about the impact of holiday food poverty on children with parents on low incomes. Plus minimalist camping tips to get children off their screens and outside. Jane is joined by: Juliet Benis, Primary Head Teacher Carmel McConnell MBE, Founder of Magic Breakfast Dr Laura Harrison, Senior Lecturer in Modern History at the University of West England Briony Hartley author of Minimalist Family Camping: Dee Holmes young persons, family and children’s Counsellor for RelatePresenter: Jane Garvey Producer: Caroline Donne

Director, actor Kathy Burke on her new series of documentaries for Channel 4 “All Woman” which are about appearance, motherhood, marriage and relationships. We’ll be talking about women’s finances and the changes to income when women have a family. There's music from the Scottish songwriter Karine Polwart. Dr Amy Kavanagh a disability campaigner tells us about her experiences of harassment in public spaces. Plus a look at how to use the last few weeks of the holidays to prepare children for primary school and the wrestler Heather Bandenburg also known as La Rana Venenosa on why she thinks women’s wrestling is a feminist act.Presented by Jane Garvey Producer: Rabeka Nurmahomed Editor: Beverley PurcellGuest; Sarah Pennells Guest; Lucy Tobin Guest; Fran Bennett Guest; Helen Stroudley Guest; Vibha Ghei

Kathy Burke: actor, comedian, theatre director and for many people, a national treasure. She's got a new TV series starting next week which explores what it means to be a woman today. It looks at attitudes to beauty, motherhood and relationships. So what's she learnt from the experience? There's been a lot of publicity this week around a surgical procedure designed to delay the menopause by 20 years. Today we discuss whether the menopause really needs fixing. To talk about it, we have Dr. Melanie Davies who's a Consultant Gynaecologist and Obstetrician; Emma Hartley who's a journalist who's written about the procedure recently, and Allison Pearson who's written a novel about the menopause called How Hard Can It Be? If you're passionate about making a change, how do you persuade others to follow you? What do you have to do to create a winning campaign and why are some of the most successful ones started by young women? We hear from Kajal Odedra, author of ‘Do Something: Activism For Everyone? We also speak

Police forces across the country have found that the number of crimes involving children attacking their parents has doubled in the last three years from 7,000 to 14,000. The figures have been uncovered by BBC Yorkshire after they made a Freedom of Information request. They were invited to attend a course in Doncaster called Getting On. It’s one of a handful of similar schemes around the country which aim to help parents and children find a solution to this type of abuse. Jenni speaks to Emma Glasbey, BBC Yorkshire’s home affairs correspondent.

Woman’s Hour talks about money. Over their lives, women earn less and save less than men – and, very often, find they need more of it. Research consistently suggests that women are less likely to talk about personal finances or to seek financial advice, but far more likely to worry about it than men. We look at how we manage our relationship with money and, at what our relationships can do to our cash-flow. And, we ask what part the government, work places and financial intuitions can play in building our financial resilience and reducing gender inequality. From student debt to pensions; buying a home to saving for a pension; the costs of paying for care or doing the caring – and, the gender pay gap - we examine where things go wrong and, how we might begin to fix them.Presenter: Jenni Murray Producer: Ruth Watts Interviewed guest: Fran Bennett Interviewed guest: Amy Cashman Interviewed guest: Jude Kelly Interviewed guest: Sarah Pennells Interviewed guest: Lucy Tobin

We remember the woman considered the greatest American writer of the twentieth century – the Nobel Prize winner, Toni Morrison, who died on Monday.The number of crimes being reported to the police involving children attacking their parents has doubled in the last three years from around 7,000 to 14,000 incidents. That’s according to data obtained by BBC Yorkshire following Freedom of Information requests. The BBC has been given exclusive access to the ‘Getting On’ course in Doncaster. It’s one of just a handful of similar courses across the country, designed to help parents and children find a solution to this type of abuse.Former Blue Peter presenter, actress and author Janet Ellis joins Jenni to discuss her new novel 'How It Was', the follow-up to her acclaimed debut, The Butcher’s Hook. It looks at the generational divides between mothers and daughters, and deals with difficult topics such as parental bereavement, miscarriage and inappropriate underage relationships.Scottish songwriter and musician, Karine

Disability campaigner Dr Amy Kavanagh describes how she experienced harassment in public spaces when she started to use a white cane. Now she has started a project with Dr Hannah Mason-Bish, Director of Centre for Gender Studies at Sussex University to tackle the issue and the intrusions that she and many others face. ‘Beauty is your duty’ was an official propaganda campaign during WWII and the wearing of bright red lipstick seemed to be a patriotic duty and flash of glamour during tough times. While many factories and workers were commandeered for the war effort, the production of lipstick at Yardley’s cosmetics factory in East London continued apace. Kate Thompson’s latest book Secrets of the Homefront Girls features the lives and hardships of the women working in these factories. She joins Jane with two of the original Yardley Girls – Ann and Eileen. What is breast milk donation and why are some people calling for it to be better funded? Jane talks to author Francesca Segal whose premature twins need

Hints and tips on helping your child settle into primary school from early years consultant Helen Stroudley and mum of two Vibha Ghei who are part of a new BBC Bitesize Campaign. According to the TUC, half of women have experienced sexual harassment in the workplace. Rights of Women have just launched the only specialist free legal advice line in England and Wales to help them. We hear more from Deeba Syed, senior legal advisor from Rights of Women, and Dame Heather Rabbatts, Chair of TIME’S UP UKPlus Dame Victoria Sharp the new President of the Queen’s Bench Division - the first woman to hold the post - which makes her the third most senior member of the judiciary of England and Wales. And dress historian Amber Butchart with another in her series about our summer wardrobe staple - today espadrilles.Presenter Jane Garvey Producer Beverley PurcellGuest; DEEBA SYED, Guest; DAME HEATHER RABBATTS Guest; HELEN STROUDLEY Guest; VIBHA GHEI Guest; DAME VICTORIA SHARP Guest; AMBER BUTCHART

The journalist and writer, Lyra McKee was shot dead in Londonderry nearly four months ago. She had been watching rioting in the Creggan area of the city. Her book Angels With Blue Faces, written before her death has just been published. We hear from her sister Nichola Corner.Careworker Caroline inspired this week’s drama serial Flying Visits. Frustrated by the requirement to keep her home visits to fifteen minutes, she made an impassioned speech to councillors in Southwark, London which led them to change their policy. Caroline, Ian Hudspeth from the Local Government Association and Donna Rowe-Merriman from UNISON discuss the challenges associated with home care visits.The singer Angelique Kidjo has three Grammy awards and has been described as the undisputed queen of African music. Her latest album Celia is a tribute to the Cuban salsa singer Celia Cruz. She sings for us in the studio.Endometriosis is a serious and lifelong disease which affects as many as 1 in 10 women. But it often goes undiagnosed. Karen

It’s been nearly four months since the young journalist and writer, Lyra McKee, was shot in Londonderry; she had been watching rioting in the Creggan area of the city. She had just written a book called 'Angels With Blue Faces' and a week before she died, had approved the cover for it. Lyra didn’t get to see it published, but this afternoon it will officially be launched in The Linen Hall Library in Belfast, where she did most of her research. Her sister Nichola speaks to us from Belfast. A new survey of older women readers by Gransnet (with publisher HarperCollins) has revealed how they really feel about their portrayal in fiction. Just over half of women over 40 say their age group is portrayed in clichéd roles, and 47 per cent say there’s not enough books about middle-aged or older women. Yet women over 45 buy more fiction than any others, and 84 per cent say they read every day, or almost every day. So how are older women portrayed in fiction? Are we only reading about very stereotypical characters? Are

Women in rural areas are half as likely to report domestic abuse as those in urban ones. Judith, who moved to the Scottish Highlands from London, tells reporter Kathleen Garragher about the culture of privacy and keeping yourself to yourself. When her husband became abusive she didn’t feel able to ask for help. Endometriosis is a serious and lifelong disease which affects as many as 1 in 10 women. But it often goes undiagnosed. Karen Havelin has turned her experience of the disease into a novel, 'Please Read This Leaflet Carefully'. And Eleanor Thom has written a manual aimed at her fellow sufferers, as well as their friends and family, 'Private Parts: How to Really Live with Endometriosis'. Iranian women have been taking pictures of themselves out in public and without their headscarves as part of the #WhiteWednesdays protests. The head of Tehran's Revolutionary Court has said that they now risk up to ten years in prison for sharing their pictures and videos. We talk to Masih Alinejad, the activist behind

Gemma Chan talks about her role in the Channel 4 drama "I Am Hannah" - a woman in her mid-thirties struggling with the pressure to settle down and start a family.The ruler of Dubai and his estranged wife, Princess Haya, are in court this week battling over the welfare of their children. Princess Haya fled Dubai earlier this year and has been reportedly living in hiding in London. We hear from Louise Callaghan, Middle East Correspondent for the Sunday Times, who's been following the Dubai family saga for the past year, and BBC Law in Action’s Joshua Rozenberg who's been in court this week watching proceedings.Do we take children’s picture books, lullabies and nursery rhymes as seriously as we should? The writer Clare Pollard says NO and explores in her new book " Fierce Bad Rabbits" the stories that meant the world to her as a child and how they represent women. And the dress historian Amber Butchart has been finding out about the history of some of the summer wardrobe staples which get shoved into s