“I Am Woman” became the unofficial anthem of the Women’s Liberation Movement, and Reddy said in a 2013 interview that she was just trying to represent the women in her life with the empowering song. “There were a lot of songs on the radio about being weak and being dainty and all those sort of things,” she told the Chicago Tribune. “All the women in my family, they were strong women. They worked. They lived through the Depression and a world war, and they were just strong women. I certainly didn’t see myself as being dainty.”
A biopic about Reddy titled after her signature hit debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival last fall, and I Am Woman star Tilda Cobham-Hervey spoke with Billboard at the time about the song’s staying power. “As much as this song is so relevant today, I think it will always be relevant to women,” the actress said. “It’s a really empowering song. It talks about the future and it’s really about bringing people together. I hope it’s a song that’s really inclusive of all people, of all gender identities. I also think that as much as there’s still a long way to go, it’s amazing to look back and see how far we’ve come too. She had to live through a lot of things that I know today I don’t have this struggle with.
Jamie Lee Curtis took to Twitter to remember introducing Reddy at the Women’s March back in January 2017, calling the moment “the honor of my life.
Source: Helen Reddy, Voice of the Feminist Anthem ‘I Am Woman,’ Dies at 78
