Women’s roles, women’s rights and women’s identities in our culture are constantly shifting. Pop culture reflects — and sometimes even drives — those changes. On this episode of Talk of Iowa, host Charity Nebbe talks with experts about pop culture moments through history that shed light on what it's like to be a woman.

We start with this summer's blockbuster Barbie, which relies on our understanding of women's power and gender equality for its humor. But whether it's Margot Robbie contemplating her mortality, Dolly Parton threatening to turn her boss from a rooster to a hen in 9 to 5, Tracy Chapman singing about her life as a working-class woman of color or Michelle Yeoh tackling Everything Everywhere All at Once, all of these pop culture moments hold important lessons about what it's like to be a woman.

This episode is part of Talk of Iowa's Womanhood series, airing from Oct. 23 - Oct. 27.

Guests:

Karen Kedrowski, director of the Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women and Politics at Iowa State University

Sarah Purcell, chair of digital studies and L.F. Parker Professor of History at Grinnell College

Meenakshi Gigi Durham, professor in journalism and mass communication and gender, women’s and sexuality studies at University of Iowa

Faber McAlister, associate professor of rhetoric and media studies and director of the Cowles Speaking Center at Drake University