The University of Oregon Women’s Center will celebrate International Women’s Day on Wednesday, March 11 with an event in the EMU ballroom. The event will bring people together from across the community to celebrate women’s roles in society and educate on the work toward gender equality.

Originally known as National Women’s Day, the first Women’s Day was called by the Socialist Party of America in New York City on Feb. 28, 1909. The event drew thousands and united labor activists and those for women’s suffrage, according to a History.com article.

The year after the Socialist Party of America’s original event, German socialist activist Clara Zetkin took the event international by establishing the International Conference of Working Women, according to Time magazine.

Russia saw massive International Women’s Day protests in 1917 Russia. The International Women’s Day website cites the death of over 2 million Russian soldiers in World War I as the reason thousands of Russian working women took to the streets on March 8 and began a strike for “bread and peace.” A week later, Czar Nicholas abdicated. “This was probably the most consequential of any International Women’s Day demonstrations of any time,” Russian historian Rochelle Ruthchild said to Time. International Women’s Day has been celebrated on March 8 ever since.

The United Nations first celebrated International Women’s Day in 1975, International Women’s Year, according to the UN website. Two years later, the UN adopted a resolution inviting member states to designate a Day for Women’s Rights and International Peace on any day of the year in accordance with local customs.

Related: International Women’s Day celebrated on campus

The Women’s Center has been celebrating International Women’s Day since at least 2000. This year’s event, stylized as the International Womxn’s Day Celebration to be inclusive of gender expressions beyond binary womanhood, will include a dozen performances ranging from a presentation from representatives from No Lost Generation, an immigrant advocacy student group, to traditional dancers from multiple cultures to a keynote speech by Vera Sebulsky, a refugee from the Soviet Union.

International Womxn’s Day Celebration organizer Aqsa Khan said of the event, “This is more like a cultural celebration. It’s more of a celebratory event that’s celebrating women from all over the world. It’s not just American women or Pakistani women. It’s a celebration of womanhood globally.”

The Women’s Center International Womxn’s Day Celebration will take place from 6-8 p.m. on Wednesday in the EMU Ballroom. The event is free and open to the public, but space is limited.