M. dances at a go-go bar. She was working as a topless dancer — and also as a sex worker — in the tourist city of Pattaya, Thailand, until the bar closed down in January. She decided to return to her hometown to look for work in a different sector. Allison Joyce for NPR hide caption
Volunteers and trainees with the group Bikeygees at a park in Berlin in July. The organization teaches refugee women in Germany how to ride bikes. Trainee Shapol Bakir-Rasoul, a refugee from Iraq, holds up a Bikeygees sign with founder Annette Krüger, right. Behind them in yellow is volunteer Shaha Khalef, a refugee from Iraq. Deborah Amos/NPR hide caption
Alibaba's headquarters in Hangzhou, China. A female employee at the tech company is alleging that she was sexually assaulted by her manager. Long Wei/VCG via Getty Images hide caption
From left: Giovanna Basso, Mofiyin Onanuga, Emma Fetzer and Joanne Lee are teen leaders for the U.N.-sponsored gender equality group Girl Up. They attended Girl Up's virtual conference last week, which featured Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai as a guest speaker. Giovanna Basso, Mofiyin Onanuga, Emma Fetzer, Joanne Lee hide caption
Pooja Sharma (center) and her two daughters, Lata, 14, and Yukti, 12, sit in front of a portrait of Sharma's late husband and the girls' father, Manmohan. He died from COVID-19 in April, leaving Sharma to fend for her family by herself. Pooja Sharma hide caption
Students work on a classroom exercise at a school in Kibera, a poor neighborhood in Nairobi, Kenya. Tony Karumba/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
From left: Home cooked food at Srabasti Ghosh's home, ready for delivery. A volunteer delivers food to COVID-19 patients outside their home. Ghosh (right) with a friend who has joined to help. Srabasti Ghosh hide caption
Priyali Sur, 29 weeks pregnant, at home in Delhi on April 30. Boaz Slater Lee hide caption
Shakuntala Thilsted, winner of the 2021 World Food Prize, is one of the world's leading experts on the nutritional benefits of small fish. Finn Thilsted hide caption
Masuma Ahuja, author of Girlhood: Teenagers Around The World In Their Own Voices, set out to document girls' ordinary lives. Kassy Cho hide caption
Field hockey star Sarita Bhise (right) with her mother (far left) and maternal aunt, cleaning onions they've harvested on the family farm. Ananda Bhise hide caption
From left to right: Naomi Ochoa, Crystal Watts and Danielle Demetria East Douglas Watts, Jr., Lacie Freelen and Ariel Britt hide caption
Marissa Tuping, a rural midwife, and Risa Calibuso, right, arrive in Nueva Vizcaya Provincial Hospital on July 21. Calibuso gave birth to her son moments later. Xyza Cruz Bacani For NPR hide caption
Dola Banerjee homeschools her children in New Delhi in August. Jyoti Kapoor/The India Today Group via Getty hide caption
Joan Garcia became pregnant at 14 and gave birth at 15. She and her child travel by raft between the two shacks where they live in Navotas fish port on Manila Bay. Hannah Reyes Morales for NPR hide caption
Slam poet and UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Emi Mahmoud performs at the Sziget Festival in Hungary in 2019. László Mudra/Rockstar Photographers hide caption
Eliza Chikoti, 24, is a mentor to high school girls in Malawi. She is helping girls through their personal problems amid the pandemic — and encouraging them to stay in school. Anke Adams hide caption
Surrounded by some members of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, President Trump speaks at a press conference on COVID-19 in March in the Rose Garden. Of the 27 task force members, two are women, standing to Trump's left: Dr. Deborah Birx and Seema Verma (holding the sheaf of papers). Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Elham Mansori, Florence Poya, Nahida Khajazadeh and Somaya Farooqi, members of the Afghan Dreamers, are building a mechanized version of the hand-operated ventilator. The Digital Citizen Fund hide caption
A newborn baby girl receives treatment for the gun wound in her right leg received during the attack on a maternity clinic in Kabul this week. The gunmen killed her mother. Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Scottish Parliament member Monica Lennon (right) joins supporters of the Period Products bill she sponsored, at a rally outside Parliament in Edinburgh on Tuesday. The legislation would make Scotland the first country in the world to make products like pads and tampons freely available. Andrew Milligan/PA Images via Getty Images hide caption