Page:Radio Times - 1926-01-01 - p1 (cropped - Lady Alexander).jpg





'''[Lady Alexander is the widow of Sir, the celebrated actor. In this thoughtful article she discusses the influence of broadcasting upon woman's position and progress.]'''

HEN a friend of mine, who lives in Yorkshire, came up to London a few weeks ago, I noticed that she was wearing the latest creation in hats. That particular design, I believe, had scarcely appeared in the leading London shops. We two are in that happy, or unhappy, position which friends attain of being intimate enough to comment upon such personal matters without being considered thoroughly rude. I could not forbear mentioning the hat. It fascinated me.

"Oh" she replied, in a falsely superior tone, "you mustn't think that because I'm tucked away in the backwoods, I'm behind the times. I heard about this kind of hat over the wireless." What she confided to me about the effect of broadcasting upon her quiet life in the country set me thinking.

Few women listeners to whom I have spoken seem to realise how specially they are catered for by radio. Most items ostensibly arranged for men, such as motoring, racing, and golfing talks, are equally interesting to women. Men have no special preserve in the ether. We women have.

If you have learned how to tune your set when your men folk are away, you can listen, nearly every day during the women's hour, to something about household management, house decoration, glimpses at the shop windows, or to other interesting feminine topics. The readings from good books, too, which have been broadcast frequently during our special hour are immensely interesting and, I fancy, have renewed in many women a preference for serious literature in place of trashy novels.

A woman told me recently that she had decided to winter abroad this year in a certain locality—which she had not done since the war—merely because her interest in the place was fired by a wireless talk. And I know dozens of women who listen every night to the Children's Hour. Those radio uncles and aunts can give hints to many parents who find it difficult to amuse their children.

But these obvious advantages of broadcasting to women are not the only ones, not the most important. There is a deeper significance in the subject, for I perceive a hidden yet vital change in the outlook of the women of this country which, slowly and unobtrusively, is being brought about by radio. Some years ago the majority of women were educated to live at home and, as soon as they married, had to settle down to a daily round of duties and ceremonies which seldom suffered much variation.

Monotony—soul-searing monotony—is the bugbear of many a woman's life to-day. Ever these same four walls! These eternal