As I was browsing through Spotify this past week, I found an exciting new tab under the “Genres and Moods” section: WHM 2016. As most people know, March is Women’s History Month, which combines two of my favorite things: women and history.
Most campuses and cities have events that raise awareness about this month and women’s issues. Art galleries and museums may have special exhibits. But it’s nice to see companies getting involved in WHM too.
In 2015, Spotify ranked the most streamed female artists and created playlists that included their most streamed songs. Their playlists included “All-time most streamed female artists by women on Spotify, worldwide,” "All-time most streamed female artists by women on Spotify in the U.S.,” “All-time top 10 streamed women globally on Spotify,” and “All-time top 10 streamed women in the U.S. on Spotify.”
This year marks a huge improvement in Spotify’s women history month collection. The WHM 2016 tab has almost 30 different playlists, including music, poetry and literature. The music collections are extensive with playlists from each genre as well as “fresh finds” and “femme fatale” lists.
The literature includes entire classics, with works from the Bronte’s and Jane Austen. They also have a literature playlist, which includes short stories from a variety of women writers, like Virginia Woolf, Edith Wharton and Mary Shelley.
The poetry includes a playlist of over 70 readings of poems in the poets own voices as well as four playlists devoted to Sylvia Plath, Margret Walker, Edna St. Vincent Millay and Emily Dickenson.
There is also a women in comedy section, which I believe is extra important because of the still lingering myth that women aren’t funny. I know this is a myth because some of my favorite comedians are women: Amy Poehler, Ilana Glazer and Mindy Kaling (who are not on this playlist unfortunately). But also because some of my best girlfriends are some of the funniest people I know.
When I first found this genre, I was elated and assumed, naively, that it was here to stay. My roommate pointed out that it might only be here for the month. March has 31 days but I did the math and there is 743 hours in those 31 days and 163 hours of content to go through on WHM 2016. I thought these numbers would be more impressive but I then realized that this is 163 hours you have to add on to your regular schedule. If someone wanted to listen to all of this before the end of March they would have to add in 163 hours to the regular hours spent in class, working, sleeping, happy-hour-ing, or anything else where headphones can’t be in and Spotify can’t be on. Unless maybe you start requesting the DJ to play some Plath.
Even though there is only 163 hours of content, now, I see big potential to expand this genre if it stays beyond the month of March.
Literature on Spotify is a great way to compete with some of the other audiobook apps and *might* pull me away from my podcasts. I have been longing for playlists that feature only women and I think other women will resonate with the genre. So this is my official recommendation to listen to this genre and my official petition to keep this genre because women artists need attention and support that lasts more than just 31 days.
Update: Spotify has already added two more playlists this week! Adding five more hours of content to try and get through but also proving my point that more content can be added and this should stay forever.
