Women of interest—mona louise parsons

On a recent fall trip to Nova Scotia, I stopped at the memorial for Mona Parsons, the only Canadian woman civilian to be imprisoned by the Nazis in WW 2 for resistance activities. In she was found guilty of treason for helping and hiding downed Allied airmen escape to England from her Dutch home. She was sentenced to death by firing squad.

However, because the judge liked her quiet temperament, he told her to appeal her sentence. The cultural beliefs that women were not capable of espionage — which helped them trick the Nazis in the first place, were the same norms that helped Mona Parsons evade death. Her death sentence was overturned but she spent four years in hard labour until escaping and walking across many kilometres of German territory.

You can read more about her war journey here. As you can see they are in sharp contrast to each other. One is stately and the other rather amusing or odd for the subject matter.

Women of interest—mona louise parsons: Mona Louise Parsons, actor,

In a culture where many women find it difficult to stand up for themselves, it is important that these role models of courage be celebrated. There is something about the translation of her story into the dancing statue and the hiring of a male artist to interpret and create her visual story that saddens me because it is a repetition of the same western norms that hold women in a subordinate place.

The statue simultaneously honours freedom and yet denies her attributes of courage, tenacity, intelligence and more.