大象传媒

According to the UN, one in three women on the planet will be raped or beaten in her lifetime. That鈥檚 the equivalent of one billion women and girls, and it鈥檚 a figure that has inspired the author of The Vagina Monologues, Eve Ensler, to launch . She describes it as a global day of dance action, and on 14 February she鈥檚 hoping that one billion women, and the men who love them, will leave whatever they鈥檙e doing to go and dance to raise awareness and end violence against women and girls. Eve Ensler joins Aasmah Mir to talk about the campaign.

Susannah Cahalan was a 24 year old newspaper reporter for the New York Post when she quickly developed acute psychosis 鈥� a condition which sparked a descent into 鈥渕adness鈥�, a desperate search for a diagnosis, and which baffled doctors, who began to believe she could be confined to a psychiatric ward. She was eventually diagnosed with a rare brain condition 鈥� anti-NMDA receptor autoimmune encephalitis 鈥� an autoimmune disease which attacked her brain and caused her psychotic behaviour. It helped her start a journey of recovery, and enabled her to write about her story in her new book, Brain On Fire. Susannah joins Aasmah Mir to describe her experiences of this strain of encephalitis, along with Professor Tom Solomon, Chair of Neurological Science and Head of the 听at the University of Liverpool,听who is also听based at the , the only specialist neurosciences NHS Trust in the UK.

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Presiding Officer for the National Assembly for Wales, Rosemary Butler AM, has written to the leaders of all four political parties in Wales to raise the issue of women鈥檚 representation.听From being a world leader in women鈥檚 political representation听with over 50 per cent women, Wales has seen a drop off in the number of female Assembly Members since 2007, and a similar pattern has emerged in the Scottish Parliament. Rosemary听joins Elaine Smith MSP听to discuss the issues with Aasmah Mir.

We hear from women who have grown up as children of 鈥榮econd鈥� families - where their mother is their father鈥檚 mistress and their father has another 鈥榝irst鈥� family elsewhere. And writer talks to Aasmah Mir about her new book, All The Beggars Riding, in which she tells the story of Lara who finds out when she is听12 that her father has another 鈥榩roper鈥� home elsewhere.

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All The Beggars Riding by Lucy Caldwell is published by Faber