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?
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 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 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 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.