“Noëlla, you were born on December 25, 1919. When the war breaks out, you cannot continue your literature studies. “ Each episode begins as a letter sent to the woman she is going to honor, which thousands of curious ears can enjoy. A biography told in a simple but devouring style, which always ends with the activist: “If you listen to me, Noëlla (Rouget), Simone (Veil), Françoise (Héritier), know that you have a sacred pair of ovaries. “ With malice, Marie Bongars drew the name of her podcast which recalls, contrary to what the French language might suggest, that courage is not a particularly masculine attribute.
“They made it possible to build these nations”
Born in Rennes thirty-two years ago, she grew up in Dinard, where her parents still live. Then Marie studied in Paris, not as a journalist, but… as a physiotherapist. A graduate, this passionate sportswoman opened a practice in Lorient before landing a position as a physiotherapist for the French judo teams.
An adventure that takes him abroad three to four months a year, during competitions. She is in Georgia and Azerbaijan when, in 2018, she is surprised “Not to see women in the streets”. “I said to myself: it is not possible, there are many women who have made it possible to build these nations culturally, intellectually, scientifically …” Between treatments and training, Marie often has a ” timeout “ 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. She took the opportunity to do some research on the Internet.
And you don’t have to go far to find that “The first woman to rule the world alone was Tamar from Georgia. She made the country prosper, without giving in to marriage and wedding rings that did not suit her. » In Azerbaijan, she discovers that “One of the fiercest opponents of power is a woman: Khadija Ismayilova ».
This great listener of radio programs that she listens to offline when she is abroad, for “Keep a time marker that connects me to France” , then has an idea: to tell the story of little-known women. “I looked on the Internet for the price of a good microphone and found an online tutorial on how to edit. “
The advent of podcasts encourages him to use a style “Simple and straightforward”. Hence this sort of letter, read aloud. The familiarity allows him “ to create proximity and sorority ” , that is to say, female solidarity.
“We are what we want to be”
“These amazing women didn’t wake up saying to themselves: “I’m going to be the greatest tennis player in the world”. They were discriminated against, encountered difficulties and fought. It is this journey that I want to share, to show that we can all be what we want to be. “
Why can’t most people name five names of women artists or scientists? “It’s the Matilda effect (1), that is to say the invisibilization of women, the fact that their findings have been systematically minimized in research. It was linked to the time: there were few women in the labs, they were not allowed to sign scientific articles or co-sign them with a man whose name was only remembered. “
In addition to sexism, there is also racism. Women had to wait thirty years to see the sanitary napkin invented in 1956 by the African-American Mary Kenner on the market: “When the company that wanted to patent it saw that it was black, they refused it. “
Each episode traces the life of a more or less well-known woman, contemporary or not: the filmmaker Agnès Varda, the American judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the resistant Noëlla Rouget, the feminist anthropologist Françoise Héritier, the Indian queen of bandits Phoolan Devi or the first Nobel Prize in medicine, Gerty Theresa Cori.
“It is enough to start from a news item, a historical or scientific fact. Regularly, a woman is at the origin. I am looking for articles in French, English, documentaries on her… ” A second job for this mother of a baby, who now lives with her partner in the Netherlands. One hell of a pair of ovaries counts 50,000 to 100,000 monthly listenings and its author, who feeds every day new stories of inspiring women, does not intend to stop there.
(1) In reference to the American feminist activist of the XIXe century Matilda Joslyn Gage.
One hell of a pair of ovaries, on podcast platforms and on unesacreepairedovaires.fr.
Also find the “sorority” podcasts on The podcast wall of West France.
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