Equality Day in Finland (Minna Kant Day) (19/03)

Every year on March 19, Finns celebrate Equality Day (Finnish). Tasa-arvon päivä, Swede. Jämställdhetsdagen). It coincides with the birthday of Minna Kant, a writer, playwright, journalist, and public figure who lived in the second half of the 19th century. Therefore, this holiday is also known as Minna Kant Day (Finnish). Minna Canthin päivä, Swede. Minna Canth-dagen).

The Finnish Ministry of the Interior proposed celebrating this date in 2003, and in 2007 it officially entered the calendar of public holidays.

Minna Kant (Finnish. Minna Canth, 1844—1897) — under this abbreviated name is the born Ulrika Wilhelmina Johnson — dedicated her works in Finnish and Swedish to women, paying special attention to their heavy lot and unfair treatment of them. Largely thanks to her, in 1906, in the Grand Duchy of Finland, women received the right to vote on an equal basis with men — for the first time in all of Europe.

The future writer and first Finnish female journalist was born into the family of a merchant, a former factory worker. Wilhelmina received a good education at the teachers' seminary, but never began teaching — married Johan Ferdinand Kant, having had seven children with him.

However, after just 14 years of marriage, Minna's husband died, and in order to feed her family, she had to master the — business of running a thread store that previously belonged to her father. Successful business allowed Minna to engage in literary and social activities in parallel, and her home became a meeting place for the Finnish intelligentsia. Her salon discussed the progressive ideas of Darwinism and materialist philosophy, the problems of women's equality and the secondary position of the Finnish language and culture.

Minna Kant's birthday is celebrated throughout Finland today. On March 19, national flags are raised in the country in honor of Equality Day, and flowers are brought to the writer’s monument.

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