Media Diversified
Media Diversified was a UK-based nonprofit media and advocacy organisation for writers and journalists of colour, founded by filmmaker Samantha Asumadu in 2013.{{cite web|title=10 Black British Women Who Are Killing It In Their Fields|url=https://www.buzzfeed.com/tribe/10-black-british-women-who-are-killing-it-in-their-1mji0|website=Buzzfeed|accessdate=22 March 2016}} It published nonfiction articles by a variety of writers at its website, which was updated several times a week. Although much of Media Diversified's staff were UK-based, its pool of writers and its readership were international. All staff members and writers were people of colour.{{cite web|title=Contact The Team|url=https://mediadiversified.org/about-us/the-team/|website=Media Diversified|accessdate=20 July 2016}}
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
Journalist Samantha Asumadu, whose work focuses on stereotype-challenging individuals and organizations, such as female rally drivers in Uganda,{{cite web|title=Super Ladies|url=http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/witness/2009/09/200991663846321765.html|website=Al-Jazeera|accessdate=20 July 2016}} started the #AllWhiteFrontPages campaign in 2013 to critique the predominance of white people in mainstream newspaper photography.{{cite web|last1=Asumadu|first1=Samantha|title=It's time to boost ethnic minority representation in the media|url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jul/08/redress-ethnic-minority-representation-media|website=The Guardian|accessdate=22 March 2016}} 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.{{cite web|last1=Okwonga|first1=Musa|title=Why the UK media needs more writers of colour|url=http://www.newstatesman.com/media/2015/03/why-uk-media-needs-more-writers-colour|website=New Statesman|accessdate=22 March 2016}} To date, the Experts Directory is the only such database in the UK.{{cite web|last1=Reid|first1=Alastair|title=Watch: Media Diversified Experts Directory demo|url=https://www.journalism.co.uk/news/watch-media-diversified-experts-directory-launches-publicly/s2/a564859/|website=Journalism.co.uk|accessdate=29 May 2016}}{{failed verification|date=August 2016}}{{cite news|title=No excuses left for our voices not to be heard in mainstream media|url=https://twitter.com/WritersofColour/status/734482052398100480|agency=Newswatch|accessdate=25 July 2016}}{{failed verification|date=August 2016}}
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.{{cite web|last1=Goodfellow|first1=Maya|title=#TheTrashies: Challenging the media’s misinformed consensus|url=http://mediadiversified.org/2015/03/05/thetrashies-challenging-the-medias-misinformed-consensus/|website=Media Diversified|accessdate=22 March 2016}} 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.{{cite web|title=The Trashies: a discussion on journalism by people of colour {{!}} gal-dem|url=http://www.gal-dem.com/thetrashies-a-discussion-on-journalism-by-people-of-colour/|accessdate=31 August 2016|date=23 March 2016}}{{cite news|last1=Dent|first1=Grace|title=If teenage girls want to join Isis in the face of all its atrocities, then they should leave and never return|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/if-teenage-girls-want-to-join-isis-in-the-face-of-all-its-atrocities-then-they-should-leave-and-10065516.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220512/https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/if-teenage-girls-want-to-join-isis-in-the-face-of-all-its-atrocities-then-they-should-leave-and-10065516.html |archive-date=2022-05-12 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|accessdate=22 March 2016|work=The Independent|date=23 February 2015}}
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.{{cite news|last1=Flood|first1=Alison|title=First UK festival dedicated to black and minority-ethnic writers to debut next month|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jan/13/bare-lit-festival-black-minority-ethnic-writers-debuts-next-month|accessdate=22 March 2016|work=The Guardian|date=13 January 2016}}{{cite web|last1=Shaffi|first1=Sarah|title=Bare Lit Festival to celebrate BAME authors|url=http://www.thebookseller.com/news/bare-lit-festival-celebrate-bame-authors-320305|website=The Bookseller|accessdate=22 March 2016}}{{cite news|last1=Kruhly|first1=Madeleine|title=Bare Lit Festival, for Minority Writers, to Make Debut in London|url=http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/02/24/bare-lit-festival-for-minority-writers-to-make-debut-in-london/?_r=0|accessdate=22 March 2016|work=The New York Times|date=24 February 2016}}
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."Asumadu, Sam, [https://mediadiversified.org/2019/05/04/thank-you-and-goodbye-from-media-diversified/ "Thank you and Goodbye from Media Diversified"], 4 May 2019.
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{{cite web|last1=Greenslade|first1=Roy|title=Why do UK media fail to cover the deaths of black people in custody?|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2016/apr/19/why-do-uk-media-fail-to-cover-the-deaths-of-black-people-in-custody|website=The Guardian|accessdate=29 May 2016}} and the child sexual abuse perpetrated by UN peacekeeping troops.{{cite web|last1=Asumadu|first1=Samantha|last2=Kinouani|first2=Guilaine|title=The UN must smash the culture of impunity that lets peacekeepers get away with child abuse|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/04/20/the-un-must-smash-the-culture-of-impunity-that-lets-peacekeepers/|website=The Telegraph|accessdate=29 May 2016}}
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.{{cite web|last1=Jones|first1=Owen|title=EU migrants should not be left fearing for their future in the UK|url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/05/eu-migrants-fearing-future-uk-bigotry-referendum|website=The Guardian|accessdate=25 July 2016}}
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.{{cite web|title=Libertine 100 User - Libertine|url=http://liberti.ne/libertine-100-user/?member_number=49|accessdate=31 August 2016}} The following year, she was chosen to be a judge at the 2016 Comment Awards for journalism.{{cite web|title=The Comment Awards: Category Judges 2016|url=http://commentawards.com/category-judges.php|website=The Comment Awards|accessdate=20 July 2016}}