Running

The women's music movement is a feminist-centered current within folk, singer‑songwriter, and community-based music that emerged in the United States during the 1970s. It foregrounds women’s voices, lesbian visibility, and social justice, often operating through artist-run labels, collectives, and women-only or women-led performance spaces. Musically, it draws on acoustic folk, gospel-inflected harmonies, and intimate storytelling, while thematically emphasizing empowerment, consciousness-raising, and everyday experiences of women. The movement’s DIY ethos fostered a parallel music infrastructure—from recording and engineering to distribution and festivals—that aimed to model equitable cultural production and audience spaces.