African women in media symposium to hold July 27

African women in media symposium organized by Dr Yemisi Akinbobola is set to hold July 27,  at Birmingham City University. 

The symposium aims to bring together African women working in the media, and academics in the field of media and communications concerned with media, diaspora, race, gender, representation, and African feminism.

The objectives are to engage in debates on issues affecting African women in the media, provide an opportunity for the exchange of ideas between academia and industry, and opportunities for networking.

With a focus on news media, the central questions the symposium will seek to answer include:

  • What challenges do African women working in the media face?
  • How are these challenges being addressed? How might they be?
  • How are African women represented in the media?
The long-term aim of the symposium is to establish an action-orientated, supportive, and, empowering network that bridges academia and industry.
Some of the speakers and panelists at the symposium includes the following:
Minna Salami
Keynote speaker: Minna Salami
Minna Salami is a Nigerian, Finnish and Swedish writer, and the founder of the feminist blog, MsAfropolitan, through which she is frequently sought as a journalist, keynote speaker, gender specialist, lecturer and consultant. Her work advocates for global feminist awareness while critically exploring the relationship between gender, ethnicity, pop culture and social criticism from an Africa-centred perspective.
Dorothy Byrne
Dorothy Byrne, Channel 4
Dorothy Byrne is the Head of News and Current Affairs at Channel 4, will be taking pitches for stories and ideas for Channel 4.

 

Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi

Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi

Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi is a freelance journalist and writer-in-residence at Lacuna at the Centre for Human Rights in Practice, University of Warwick. Rebecca has been published by a range of publications including open Democracy, the Guardian, the New Statesman, the Washington Post, the New Internationalist, and the Socialist Lawyer. Rebecca’s reporting on immigration and asylum across the European Union was shortlisted for the 2012 George Orwell Prize for Political Writing (blog category) and the 2013 Speaking Together Media Award.

Yousra Elbagir

Yousra Elbagir

Yousra Elbagir is an award-winning Sudanese freelance reporter, based between Khartoum and London. Her work has been featured on the BBC World Service, The Guardian, CNN, the Financial Times and more.

She interweaves news and culture to produce written, radio and video reports that put the developing world perspective at the forefront of mainstream media.

 

Muna Ahmed

Muna Ahmed

Muna Ahmed is an award-winning radio producer who specialises in short – form productions and station sound but she has now turned her hand to documentary making. Muna recently produced an award-winning documentary for BBC World Service and Radio4. When Muna is not making documentaries she is producing content with prisoners for National Prison Radio. Muna’s passion for radio began at Birmingham City University where she gained a first class degree in Media and Communications.

 

Kiri Kankhwende

Kiri Kankhwende

Kiri is a Malawian journalist and blogger specialising in immigration and politics. She has a background in French and Chinese language studies and holds an MSc in International Political Communications, Politics and Human Rights Advocacy. She is published in Guardian, and the Independent, and has been a contributor on BBC TV and radio, Al-Jazeera and Fox News, both as a member of the Media Diversified network and in her role directing media advocacy for CSW, a human rights charity specialising in freedom of religion or belief.

Panelists will discuss the role, and current practices, of diaspora and ethnic media in their representation and empowerment of African women. Panelists speaking on online media will look both at African feminism, representation and cultural exchange between the UK, USA, Nigeria and Ghana.

 

Dr Oluyinka Esan

Dr Oluyinka Esan
Dr Esan is a Reader in Media and Film at the University of Winchester. Her paper titled ‘Defining Women’s Voices: Across Borders and Over the Years’ draws on secondary data for an historical perspective, and primary data for contemporary empirical evidence. It focuses on patterns of participation of women as media professionals in a sample of Nigerian television channels that cater for audiences both in Nigeria and its diaspora.
The African women in media symposium  is a Women’s Network Event Funded by MeCCSA Women’s Media Studies Network and Birmingham Centre for Media and Culture Research (BCMCR), Birmingham City University and its a ticketed event.

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