GlobalGirl Media is dedicated to empowering high school age girls from under-served communities through media, leadership and journalistic training to have a voice in the global media universe and their own futures.
We have had some exciting updates recently at Global Girl Media.
The Los Angeles Global Girls have been continuing to report on local events. They attended a screening of the documentary film "Tapestries of Hope," about Betty Makoni's work with young girls who have been sexually abused in Zimbabwe in which they conducted an interview with the legendary TV Produced Suzanne de Passe about he importance of reporting on these issues to the world. It's a brave film, flawed a bit in terms of the POV, but important to shine light on how individual heroic African women are bringing change to their communities. www.tapestriesofhope.com
Another GGM Los Angeles event was the United Nation's Initiative, Girl Up! "Girls Unite Tour." The rally focused on the issues girls face around the world by setting up stations to represent different developing countries for people to participate in educational activities.
Los Angeles Global Girl, Martha Mejia, confidently interviewed and filmed the volunteers running each station as well as the program director of Girl Up! and many of the people attending the rally. Surprisingly, she was the only female camera person at the event! This is a great example of why Global Girl Media and teaching young women media tools and techniques is so important! A highlight of the evening was when she introduced herself to and discussed her involvement with Global Girl Media with the Queen Rania Al-Abdullah of Jordan, who was a guest speaker at the event.
I am also very happy to announce that we opened our new office this past week! Located near Hamilton High School (where my son just started in the Humanities Magnet--how convenient!) It is equipped with a green screen for the Global Girls to work on their projects in a studio setting. We will be having an office launch party to celebrate soon!
We are also gearing up for our new projects in the Middle East and North Africa. We are planning to connect the Los Angeles and the South Africa Global Girls with the young women we work with in the Middle East and North Africa. Stay tuned! And please pass along this blog to anyone you may know...
I cant believe it's been four months since I said goodbye to the Global Girls of Soweto, South Africa. Due to all kinds of craziness back here at home, and the fact that my other job is producing political ads for candidates running is the most recent election (!) you can imagine my state of mind for the past weeks...
Needless to say I have been returning again and again to the streets of Soweto, where I ran alongside these amazing young women, chasing their dreams, their stories as they captured some powerful imagery of their country at an historic and challenging time: just weeks after the euphoria of the World Cup the country descended into the words general strike since apartheid.
So anyway, here is what I wrote for the documentary film we produced fpr Al Jazeera about our time in South Africa, which you can watch here: http://tinyurl.com/247vl2v,
Stop that car! That one over there!" It is the day before the opening of the World Cup and I am standing at an intersection in Ipelegeng, Soweto in South Africa watching a group of five teenage Sowetan girls race across the street towards a little red Toyota.
They are dodging traffic, video camera, microphone, and sound boom in hand, as they scoot past vehicles, hooting and hollering for the car full of seemingly terrified passengers to stop.
As this streaking comet of pink t-shirted, white-capped zeal reaches their destination, I am finally able to see what the "big deal" is all about: The car is full of Mexican football fans, all here for the next day's opening match against Bafana Bafana, South Africa's beloved home team.
They are decked out in red, green, and white, some wearing soccer jerseys, others more traditional garb - against the backdrop of Soweto, these foreign visitors stick out like a sore thumb.
I break into a smile as I watch the girls set up the shot, and think to myself, "Wow. We are really doing this. It is finally happening."
Unheard female voices
Who would have thought I would be here, in South Africa during the 2010 World Cup, teaching 22 young women to be aspiring journalists?
Eighteen months ago, Global Girl Media was nothing more than an idea, a conversation between Meena Nanji, a fellow filmmaker also based out of Los Angeles, and myself.
Both of us were lamenting this gnawing feeling that despite all of this new digital technology and increased global access to information there was still something missing from the medium: Women, particularly young women in the developing world and marginalised communities in the West, were not just underrepresented, they were nearly silent.
No one was telling their stories. No one was reporting from their perspective. No one was listening to the millions of young girls out there dealing with major life issues from poverty to HIV to gang violence to women's rights in real time.
As a woman, as a filmmaker, and as a mother, this silence was to me more than just deafening - it was frustratingly discriminatory and real evidence of just how lopsided the voices that are heard in media have become.
Obstacles
SPECIAL COVERAGE
When Meena and I started brainstorming this project, there was never any doubt as to why Global Girl Media needed to exist - this was obvious. The biggest question was: Well now how do we do it?
Like many of the young women we serve, Global Girl Media (GGM) was born into a battleground of obstacles and was competing for resources even before it got off the ground.
Countless numbers of potential funders initially turned us down, many asking us what we thought was the most obvious question in the world: "Why girls?"
As women, this seemed so obvious to us - for years this is what we have come up against in our own efforts to make films and to tell stories.
It was so frustrating and incomprehensible that now that we were attempting to do something about this dissonance in the industry, we were running up against the same barricades and the same attitudes that drove us to start Global Girl Media in the first place.
With nurturing and time, however, this project did happen. We found funders who understood our mission and our passion, who understand that media was moving in a new direction and that the youth of today, particularly the young women of this world, were going to be at the forefront of this change. All they needed were the tools and the education to do it.
The 'real' Africa
Global Girl Media officially got off the ground in mid-2009 with a grant from the Nike Foundation. In the process of all of this, I jumped on the idea of having our first projects rotate around the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
Not only was this going to be a major historical event for South Africa, I also knew that the deeper stories, the direct impact of the World Cup on young people of the region was probably not going to be accurately reported, if it was going to be reported at all.
I spent many years living and working in Kenya - when the post-election violence of 2007/2008 erupted, I was saddened by how not only the events, but also the Kenyan people themselves were misrepresented by the foreign press.
If the world was going to learn about the "real" Africa, if they were going to hear more than just disparate stories from fanatic football fans to the mainstream, generic tales of desperately poor, Aids-ravaged Africans, this was going to need to be a grassroots effort from young women themselves.
We asked: What do you want to report on? What do you want the world to know about you, about your community? Tell us how you want to be portrayed and we will give you the tools to do it.
For the past three weeks, this is exactly what we have been doing. Twenty-two young women have gone from being just another group of girls to this extraordinary team of reporters.
Their articulateness, their passion, their hunger for information is insatiable. Twelve hour days, training, teaching, interviewing, has the four trainers - myself, Meena and Therese from GGM, and Meagan, from the Global Press Institute, barely functional by the end of the day.
The girls on the other hand, it is like they are just getting started. In the three short weeks they have been part of this programme, they have already interviewed major international football players, local TV celebrities, street vendors, fans and international music icons.
They have appeared on ESPN, Univision, Soweto TV, and SABC. These girls are a force of nature unto themselves and it is as if everywhere they go, people want to know who they are. I want people to know, too. I want them to know that for every interview and every mini-documentary these young ladies do on film, there is a personal story and a journey behind it, even if it is not quite apparent to the viewers at home.
Tebogo's story
The idea to tell the story of one Global Girl in particular was a decision I did not take lightly.
The programme we are running here is more than just training - it is a very personal and exceptional experience for these girls, most of whom overcome incredible odds to make it into that library in Soweto every day.
We have become a kind of large, functioning dysfunctional family, not without our daily spats and challenges.
But one girl drew me to her with her outward strength - Tebogo, who belied an inner struggle, one which became more and more apparent.
While all the girls broke down sobbing one day, she was the one writing in her journal, dry-eyed and distant. When her team researched a story on HIV, Tebogo turned sullen, unable to participate.
At first she told me she lived at home with her mother and sister. Later I learned that she had been living with her aunt since her mother and young brother died.
This aunt had her working like a modern-day Cinderella, cooking and cleaning instead of studying, even though it was clear she was an outstanding student. She started to open up, and her story is the subject of this film.
I want to be clear, however that while it is Tebogo's story, it is also the collective story of all the original Global Girls.
All these brave souls I have had the privilege to work with for the past four weeks. I have held their hands, framed their shots, taught them about aperture, white balance, and unbalanced versus balanced sound.
Yet they have taught me so much more. Back in Los Angeles, editing the piece, I hear their voices, singing in perfect harmony, I see them pouring over an article on the internet or dancing in the stadium, screaming at the top of their lungs. And if the world does not hear them yet, they soon will.
They are the Global Girls of Soweto, and this is one World Cup that I can personally say has not only changed the face of football, but also uprooted the goal posts.
Global Girl Media is pleased to announce that the Nike Foundation has awarded we a seed grant for our Kick It Up! project in South Africa this summer! We are extremely excited to work with the Nike Foundation which is a leader in innovative strategies unleashing the power of adolescent girls worldwide. Check out their awesome programs at www.nikefoundation.org and www.girleffect.org.
It's only five months to the WORLD CUP! Vuvuleza!!! And Global Girl will be there! If you're a World Cup fan, a lover of South Africa, a global perspective-type, a media-maker, a girl soccer player, a girl with a camera, or a girl with something to say, log onto http://uniteglobalgirls.ning.com and become a GLOBAL GIRL!
A Global Girl believes in her voice and the power of her story to change the world.
Global Girl Media is a powerful new non-profit organization whose mission is to nurture the voice and visions of young girls in under-served communities and developing nations, training them as citizen broadcast journalists to speak out about the issues that affect them most. The notion that anyone anywhere can access the world through media is becoming a reality, yet for most people in Africa and other developing countries, a rather slow process. While the internet and emerging technologies offer unprecedented opportunities for organizing and activism, the fact remains that this media is only open to those who have access, leaving many youth, especially girls falling hard into the “digital divide.” Media and the production of media feels like a world away to most young women (the number of working professional female film/video directors on the entire African continent is less than 10).
Global Girl Media (GGM) seeks to address this disparity by supplying the equipment, education and support necessary to help young women create content that authentically reflects their lives and communities. However, GGM does more than give girls the skills they need to create original media, we make sure it’s seen. Our cutting-edge interactive website is a place where girls can upload their videos and watch videos submitted by girls all around the world.
Global Girl Media’s pilot project, KICK IT UP! is launching in June, 2010 and we need your help! Our goal is to train 20 girls in the historic township of Soweto, South Africa to cover the FIFA World Cup, held for the first time on the African Continent. Many consider the World Cup to be a male-centered event, but we know better! The Global Girls in Soweto will produce unique videos and new media content for digital upload and distribution on the web, which can then be shared with the worldwide broadcast community. Spearheaded by our fabulous celebrity spokesperson, Julie Foudy (former US Women's Soccer Team Capt. and two-time gold medalist, she is now a sportscaster for ESPN), the girls will be mentored by Julie and granted full access to all FIFA events.In addition, we will be working with several girls’ organizations in Los Angeles, where Global Girl Media is based, to develop peer-to-peer communication during the World Cup, encouraging girls to connect, blog, upload and share video about their favorite teams, players, their relationship to sports, and specific personal struggles and goals.
Research clearly shows, that both sport and media can become effective agents for self-empowerment, team-building and social change. This is what Global Girl Media is all about. By connecting girls around the world through social media, a powerful cross-cultural connection can be developed that has a far-reaching effect, changing lives, communities, fostering Girl Media is also working with many strategic partners, both in South Africa and the United States to develop the program and get the work the girls’ produce the broadest exposure possible.
If you are another non-profit, website, high school club, sports club or like-minded individual that understands the power of girls and media, please give us a call, visit our website or ning site, and lets all celebrate the voices of young women the world over.
As Nick Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn wrote in their landmark book, Half the Sky, “Changing the lives of women and girls in the developing world can change everything. The world is awakening to a powerful truth. Women and girls aren't the problem; they're the solution.”
And apologies in advance for being one of those starving artists begging on the internet, But...here goes...
I do need your vote, after all!
I am in the semi-finals of the ultimate filmmakers' competition for films such as my film, JUA KALI: HARSH SUN, set in Kenya, featuring an all-African cast and mostly African crew! We have the endorsement of the Kenyan Government through the Kenyan Film Commission as well.
Well, it's not a film yet—but it could be, and it could be this year, if you'll vote for it. The prize is $500,000, enough to produce the film. The project was chosen from 2500 entrants, made the quarterfinals of 250, and now the semi-finals which is down to just 23 filmmakers.
I wrote the script for it and have been working on it for what seems like a lifetime. It's about recent post-election violence in Kenya, told through the eyes of a young Kenyan girl, who brings a powerful message of hope to her ravaged community.
You can see footage I shot for this for the Film Independent's Director's Lab on the site-- It features the actors Idris Elba ("The Wire" and "Obsessed") and Eddie Gathegi ("Twilight"). I recently shot additional footage in Soweto where I was training young women to become journalists to cover the 2010 World Cup.
But whether or not you vote for me or other worthy projects in the semi0finals, I implore you, please visit the website—the link to it is below—and VOTE!
It's easy: click on the link, vote, and pass along the link to all your friends. Tweet, facebook, whatever. PASSING IT ALONG IS KEY!
Here's the link: www.ultimatefilmmakercompetition.com
Dont forget to check your email for confirmation of the vote, which may go to spam!
