Media Diversified

Media Diversified is a UK-based nonprofit media and advocacy organisation for writers and journalists of colour, founded by filmmaker Samantha Asumadu in 2013.[1] It publishes nonfiction articles by a variety of writers at its website, which is updated several times a week. Although much of Media Diversified's staff are UK-based, its pool of writers and its readership are international. All staff members and writers are people of colour.[2]

Major topics covered by the site include discrimination against Black, Asian, and minority ethnic people, politics, immigration, Islamophobia, intersectionality, history, popular culture, and global conflict.

History

Documentary filmmaker Samantha Asumadu, whose work focuses on stereotype-challenging individuals and organizations, such as female rally drivers in Uganda,[3] started the #AllWhiteFrontPages campaign in 2013 to critique the predominance of white people in mainstream newspaper photography.[4] Media Diversified was created that same year to advance the profiles of journalists and writers of colour.

Two years later, Media Diversified launched the Experts Directory, a database of experts of colour aimed at media organisations.[5] To date, the Experts Directory is the only such database in the UK.[6][7]

In the same year, the organisation debuted The Trashies, "[the] equivalent of Hollywood's Razzies" for journalism, to critique racist, Islamophobic and xenophobic coverage in mainstream media.[8] The "winner", chosen by popular vote, was Grace Dent for her 23 February 2015 article in The Independent on the British teenagers who left the country to join ISIS.[9][10]

In February 2016, Media Diversified presented Bare Lit, the first literary festival in the UK for authors of colour. The festival took place over 26–28 February at the Free Word Centre and the Betsey Trotwood public house in Clerkenwell, London.[11][12][13]

The closure of Media Diversified was announced in May 2019, when founder Asumadu said: "The plan is to keep our archives up in perpetuity. We’ll also keep our ebook store going in order to fund the domain and any other charges that are incurred during our winding down period....I think the biggest gift we could ever give is our promise to keep the site up for as long as it is possible. It’s an invaluable archive. Go browse."[14]

In other media

The work of Media Diversified writers has led to increased coverage of under-recognized issues in the mainstream media, such as The Guardian's 2015 article on black people in the UK dying in police custody[15] and the child sexual abuse perpetrated by UN peacekeeping troops.[16]

Owen Jones, writing in The Guardian on anti-EU migrant bigotry in the wake of Brexit, cited a Media Diversified open letter about the BBC giving platforms to racists and fascists.[17]

Accolades

In 2015, Samantha Asumadu was named as one of the Libertine 100, a list of 100 influential female thinkers in the UK, for her filmmaking and her work with Media Diversified.[18] The following year, she was chosen to be a judge at the 2016 Comment Awards for journalism.[19]

References
  1. "10 Black British Women Who Are Killing It In Their Fields". Buzzfeed. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  2. "Contact The Team". Media Diversified. Retrieved 20 July 2016.
  3. "Super Ladies". Al-Jazeera. Retrieved 20 July 2016.
  4. Asumadu, Samantha. "It's time to boost ethnic minority representation in the media". The Guardian. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  5. Okwonga, Musa. "Why the UK media needs more writers of colour". New Statesman. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  6. Reid, Alastair. "Watch: Media Diversified Experts Directory demo". Journalism.co.uk. Retrieved 29 May 2016.
  7. "No excuses left for our voices not to be heard in mainstream media". Newswatch. Retrieved 25 July 2016.
  8. Goodfellow, Maya. "#TheTrashies: Challenging the media's misinformed consensus". Media Diversified. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  9. "The Trashies: a discussion on journalism by people of colour | gal-dem". 23 March 2016. Retrieved 31 August 2016.
  10. Dent, Grace (23 February 2015). "If teenage girls want to join Isis in the face of all its atrocities, then they should leave and never return". The Independent. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  11. Flood, Alison (13 January 2016). "First UK festival dedicated to black and minority-ethnic writers to debut next month". The Guardian. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  12. Shaffi, Sarah. "Bare Lit Festival to celebrate BAME authors". The Bookseller. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  13. Kruhly, Madeleine (24 February 2016). "Bare Lit Festival, for Minority Writers, to Make Debut in London". The New York Times. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  14. Asumadu, Sam, "Thank you and Goodbye from Media Diversified", 4 May 2019.
  15. Greenslade, Roy. "Why do UK media fail to cover the deaths of black people in custody?". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 May 2016.
  16. Asumadu, Samantha; Kinouani, Guilaine. "The UN must smash the culture of impunity that lets peacekeepers get away with child abuse". The Telegraph. Retrieved 29 May 2016.
  17. Jones, Owen. "EU migrants should not be left fearing for their future in the UK". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 July 2016.
  18. "Libertine 100 User - Libertine". Retrieved 31 August 2016.
  19. "The Comment Awards: Category Judges 2016". The Comment Awards. Retrieved 20 July 2016.
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