Gender Diversity Visibility Community User Group

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Gender Diversity Visibility Community User Group (Gender Diversity Visibility Community for short; acronym, GDVCUG) is a Wikimedia User Group supporting the Wikimedia Affiliates movement. The mission of the User Group is to promote, expand, and facilitate the gender diversity visibility work being done by all language Wikipedias, WikiCommons and Wikidata, directing the research and development for the project's unique needs by managing delivery of materials and technology, planning, and organizing systems to support their production of content. We welcome anyone who is interested in these objectives to join us.

Mission

WikiProject Women in Red was founded to increase content concerning women, including members of the LGBT community who identify as women and non-binary genders; the works created by our target groups; and relevant issues (such as health, suffrage and organizations). The WikiProject also works to increase the number and coverage of redlink lists which identify missing articles. It has become evident that support is needed to improve access to sourcing, to develop networks for identifying notable members of our target groups throughout the world, and to recruit additional editors able to create and expand pertinent articles. Our User Group, Gender Diversity Visibility Community (GDVCUG), will take on the administrative tasks to support these efforts, leaving Project members free to focus on content creation. GDVCUG's specific goals include increasing visibility of the WikiProject, providing access to reference materials for content creation, and developing partnerships to enhance the WikiProject's content, coverage and impact. In addition, our mission includes formation and development of partnerships with other Affiliates who work in the area of content gender gap, being culturally-sensitive to differing viewpoints, and to aligning our work so that we aren't each "re-inventing the wheel".

Advocacy

To increase the visibility of women and non-binary genders, works created by these target groups and their activities within our movement and elevate the general knowledge of their participation worldwide.
To serve as a catalyst for positive changes in women's, girls' and non-binary gendered people's lives globally and encourage young people worldwide to participate fully within society.
To communicate the value of using the Wikimedia platform in making the contributions of our target groups more visible, so that anyone, anywhere can find information about role models with whom they can identify.
To explore the needs across communities, internally within the Wikimedia movement and externally with related partners, which will expand the access to materials to develop broader coverage of women, non-binary genders and their activities.
To support online efforts to increase content and contributor diversity.

Securing and distributing resources

To identify technological and infrastructure needs across the community, providing access as possible, to facilitate improved article creation.
To develop technical tools that will allow us to provide access to resource materials to Project members and other projects which might benefit from such references.
To create and share practical instructional resources to enable editing, virtual editathons or in-person events.
To facilitate editing and materials which address the specific challenges and needs of all communities developing articles about women.
To develop partnerships within the Wikimedia movement and outside organizations, such as universities, historical societies, feminist organizations, LGBT advocacy groups, galleries, libraries, museums, and archival holders to improve access to materials and communication methods.

Sharing opportunities

To develop communication delivery methods which allow progress to be documented.
To develop ideas to improve the methods and means of improving content about women and non-binary genders, including the visibility of that content.
To create a network of Wikieditors from Women in Red, its affiliated sister projects (Wikimujeres (Spanish), Les Sans Pages (France), and WikiDonne (Italy), Wiki Loves Women (Africa)), other Affiliates or projects and outside organizations, to enable those who have interest in women and non-binary gendered people, and their activities to share learning experiences, and collaborate on projects to improve content.

Objectives

Our overall goals are to facilitate the production of encyclopedic content.

We want to better-develop our visual identity with design guidelines.
We want to improve the promotion and visibility of WikiProject Women in Red and communicate its achievements in article creation, the need for improving resources, and provide coverage of women and non-binary people's content needs throughout Wikimedia platforms through an online presence on social media and other websites.
We aim to create a monthly newsletter to communicate successes and challenges to the Wikimedia movement and external partners in order to promote WikiProject Women in Red's goals and to facilitate delivery of solutions.
We want to develop an online Women in Red library to improve access to sources and reference materials on women and non-binary genders, which any member of the Women in Red or sister communities may access.
We want to develop an online museum to create a place to honour and inform, and to make a contribution to women's memory.
We desire to organize support for meetups and conferences around article creation relating to women and non-binary gendered people's biographies, including their works, broadly construed, and issues.
We wish to develop relationships with Women's/Gender Studies Programs at universities, historical societies, feminist organizations, LGBT advocacy groups, and archival holders worldwide to improve academic scholarship on women and non-binary genders and facilitate identification of important global figures in the history of these target groups, as well as development of sharing opportunities for resources.
We would like to explore strategies for improving the content and coverage of women and non-binary genders, as well as their participation in public and private activities with media distributors—including newspapers, academic journals, books, and so forth, in order to improve the substantive information available.
We will provide mentoring opportunities for partners to share learning experiences about successes and challenges around connecting Wikimedia and content gender gap.

Policies, Policy, Guidelines, Statement of Intent

Any articles produced or improved, images uploaded, or people who attend conferences or editing sessions sponsored by a wiki community, fall outside our scope and remain within the purview of the community organizing the event.

Outcomes

Our productivity as a user group will be measured, by the numbers of books, journals and documents that we are able to add to various archival systems for delivery to the users of the WikiProject; in the number of relationships we are able to establish with partners; and in the number of new red links we are able to add to the WikiProject's working lists.

Projects

Current projects and works in progress:

We have initiated a library project (See demo library) and are in communication with the The Wikipedia Library and Library Users Group to explore means and methods to improve the content available for reference materials on women and non-binary genders. We were successful in adding the collections of Orlando to the Cambridge Core platform and Women and Social Movements to the Alexander Street Press offerings and have a beta site developed. We have funds on deposit to purchase e-books once our site is ready to launch; however, we are still developing the site and are in need of coders to help facilitate the technology.
We have developed articles for inclusion in the Signpost regarding the developments of WikiProject Women in Red and are developing our own newsletter to highlight the achievements of editors and their articles on a monthly? basis.
We are investigating the launch of a pilot program with a United States university women's/gender study program in South Texas on the US/Mexico border. Our goals are to establish contacts to facilitate access to materials and obtain input from academics to identify contemporary or historic women and non-binary genders whose notability is established and would be considered integral additions to the encyclopedia. Recognizing the geographic limitations of the current Wikipedia Visiting Scholar program, with its focus on US and Canadian partners, we want to branch into areas throughout the globe where content about our target groups has been underdeveloped in the encyclopedia, such as Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Latin America and Europe. If we are able to successfully complete a pilot, we want to identify partners globally who can and are willing to work with us in improving the encyclopedic content on women and non-binary genders, their works and accomplishments.
We want to be more supportive of and engaged with movement strategy. In that regard, two of this User Group's organizers have applied to participate on a 2018 Working Group.
We are in the process of developing a website to facilitate communications with internal and external partners.

Activities

Discussions about planning future editing activities: Idea Development.
Index of redlink redlists (missing articles): Redlist indices
Creating essays and help guides for editors, such as Ten Simple Rules for Women in Red, Primer for AfD, AfC and PROD, Primer for creating women's biographies
Article creation and metrics of the WikiProject are regularly reported on Twitter: [1] and [2]
Twitter postings flow to our Facebook page: [3]
And are reported on Pinterest: [4]

History timeline

WikiProject Women in Red was co-founded by Rosiestep and Victuallers in July 2015 at Wikimania Mexico City.
At that same conference, WikiWomen's User Group (WWUG) was co-founded by FloNight, Keilana, and Rosiestep, with general goals for collaboration and support for women's groups within the movement.
Two of GDVCUG's co-founders, Megalibrarygirl, and SusunW joined WikiProject Women in Red in 2015 and WWUG between 2015 and 2017.
While working within the movement, the Gender Diversity Visibility Community's co-founders came to the realization that to improve content and the global visibility of women and non-binary genders, specific objectives could be better attained by creating outreach with internal and external partners. Some of our preliminary work is outlined below:

Negotiations to add the Women and Social Movements to Alexander Street Press offerings of the Wikipedia Library began in May 2017 when Sam Walton agreed to try to gain access for members of WikiProject Women in Red. Numerous followup requests were made as it was discovered that the entire access to ASP had expired. On 2 March 2018 access was granted.
In December 2017, we initiated negotiations to add the Orlando collections to the Cambridge Core platform of the Wikipedia Library with Sam Walton. Access was granted on 9 March 2018.
In February 2018 we began explorations on a gendered collection of library materials and planning for ways to utilize the donations from the Women World Contest to buy e-books accessible to all Women in Red project members. Simultaneously in mid-February, Rosiestep met with the board of Wikimedia DC, which agreed to be our fiscal sponsor and maintain an account for our book purchasing fund. SusunW contacted Sam Walton to begin discussions on how we could purchase and share e-books with our target groups. Amazon kindle has a platform for libraries to loan purchased e-books for multiple users, but books purchased by individual users are single access resources. Megalibrarygirl began work on a beta library delivery system.
Megalibrarygirl, Rosiestep, and SusunW held a video consultation with Jake Orlowitz on 20 May 2018 to discuss expanded access to reference materials and development of a library for our target groups. Follow-ups including additional representatives of the Library User Group Nicole Askin, Jason Sherman and Sam Walton occurred on May 21, 22, 24, 25, 29, 30 and June 2, 4, 5, and 10.

The Gender Diversity Visibility Community User Group, was created in July 2018 to develop a praxis for taking action to move our goals forward. Formalizing our relationship as a User Group provides an opportunity for us to develop a unique approach for strategic planning, to facilitate coordination and cooperation for improved access to materials and visibility, and better manage our funds and resources.

22 August 2018 Megalibrarygirl, Rosiestep and SusunW were joined by Camelia.boban in a video conference call with Ben Vershbow and Jake Orlowitz to continue discussions of reference materials for library development. WP Library to attempt to gain access to AllAfrica collections. SusunW (talk) 15:37, 22 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
26 August 2018, GDVCUG, AfroCROWD, Art+Feminism, and Women in Red joined together and drafted a proposal in conjunction with the WP Library staff to try to secure access to the Associated Negro Press archives. SusunW (talk) 14:58, 26 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

19 September 2018, follow-up on AllAfrica content. Advised by Orlowitz and Sam Walton that a second attempt to make contact was sent.

20 September 2018, ascertained that the Associated Negro Press archives were digitized by ProQuest as part of the Civil Rights and the Black Freedom Struggle collection. Queried WP Library as to how to access the collection.

2 October 2018, follow-up on status for AllAfrica and Associated Negro Press access. SusunW (talk) 21:08, 2 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

8 October 2018, ProQuest affiliation with the WP Library is pending and staff has asked for the collection Civil Rights and the Black Freedom Struggle to be included for use.

9 October 2018, Discovered Stanford University has access to AllAfrica collections. Unfortunately access is only available to their faculty and staff, however, they are willing to share their contact information so that we may attempt to create a relationship ourselves.

14 October 2018, contacted AllAfrica to see if we could secure access.

The following is the text sent: "I am a virtual librarian-in-residence at Wikipedia who is working with a group of editors focused on improving diversity in Wikipedia. Our organizations--Gender Diversity Visibility Community, AfroCrowd, Art+Feminism, and Women in Red--are working together to better represent the impact of the lives, narratives, and experiences of all people in the encyclopedic record of Wikipedia.

We have begun to compile various archives and journals which might be accessed to improve the coverage of historically marginalized communities in the biographical records of Wikipedia for our global outreach and writing. We recognize that there is no way the historical record can equitable and inclusive without access to All Africa.

In that regard, we are reaching out to you to explore options for access to this collection as it would be invaluable to our work and aid us in improving coverage of people of African descent on Wikipedia. Are these collections digitized and available for on-line access? If so, can we arrange a call to discuss the best way to integrate their valuable content on Wikipedia where millions will read about the material? Thank you."

There was no further response from contact at AllAfrica. This is as of November 8, 2019.

Physical women's history library has been created by Megalibrarygirl starting in March 2019, though access is limited. Megalibrarygirl (talk) 21:55, 8 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Community

Contact information

Mailing list coming soon! For now, contact us on our talk page.

Organizers

Please Join Us

We welcome all individuals and organizations to our user group. In an effort to assist us in better utilizing the skill sets of our members and supporters, if you have preferences, please indicate which areas you are interested in becoming involved in: Visual identity and design; Networking, advocacy; Social media, blogging; Newsletter; Public Relations; Online Library/reference development; Planning, strategic development; Grantwriting; Budgeting, funding; Partnership development/red lists; Information management/content (i.e. essay development, how tos, help guides, etc.); Information management/technology (infrastructure, databases, applications, tools); Coding and open source tool development; Website development.

Megalibrarygirl (talk) 16:55, 6 July 2018 (UTC) (library, partnership development)[reply]
Rosiestep (talk) 17:01, 6 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
SusunW (talk) 17:06, 6 July 2018 (UTC) (library, partnership development)[reply]
MauraWen (talk) 1:35, 7 July 2018 (UTC) (supporter)
Jane023 (talk) 06:21, 8 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Another Believer (talk) 02:42, 10 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Anthere (talk) : coordination with Wikipedia:WikiProject Wiki Loves Women and les sans pagEs (in French). WLW is launching again this month in Tanzania and Uganda and the teams over there may need help. Also, I just launched a les sans pagEs group in my area, Called w:en:Projet:Les sans pagEs/Méditerranée (focusing on mediterranean border area) and with Nattes à chat who has been working on witches for a few months, we have just decided to run a WikiSorcery event in October :) Would love to chat with you to see how we can partner on this topic.
Penny Richards (talk) 01:04, 11 July 2018 (UTC) Happy to help with social media, blogging, red lists, whatever.[reply]
Nattes à chat (talk) 04:55, 11 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Alafarge (talk) 14:57, 17 July 2018 (UTC) user guides and resource development[reply]
Thsmi002 (talk) 18:51, 19 July 2018 (UTC) (supporter) Happy to help with social media postings.[reply]
Antiqueight (talk) 20:46, 19 July 2018 (UTC) Networking, advocacy; Social media; Information management/content (i.e. essay development, how tos, help guides, etc.) Basically any ways I can help I've probably been at this long enough that I can help newbies and help create guides and certainly post about updates.[reply]
Dbudell (talk) 12:06, 22 July 2018 (UTC) I would love to help in English, Spanish, and Catalan! Great lightning talk and good luck with your user group recognition :)[reply]
Ipigott (talk) 09:02, 23 July 2018 (UTC) I hope to become more active here later, possibly in connection with extending interest to editors from other language versions of Wikipedia, especially for European languages.[reply]
Delphine Dallison (talk) 11:42, 23 July 2018 (UTC) (Supporter)[reply]
HandsomeBoy (talk) 12:00, 23 July 2018 (UTC) founder Wikimedia hub, Ibadan and Wikimedia fan club, University of Ibadan. I'll work in publising activities of this user group to members of my hub and club. I'll also do alot of retweets on Twitter to my 400+ followers.[reply]
Jess Wade (talk) Jesswade88 (talk) 18:41, 23 July 2018 (UTC) Social media, grant writing, page writing[reply]
Archkris (talk) 19:32, 23 July 2018 (UTC) (Supporter)[reply]
Camelia (talk) 10:53, 29 July 2018 (UTC): coordination with WikiDonne User Group and Progetto WikiDonne (in Italian)[reply]
Chabota (talk) 21:08, 2 August 2018 (UTC) Networking and advocacy[reply]
John Cummings (talk) 11:55, 3 August 2018 (UTC) Improving documentation, advocacy outside of Wikimedia[reply]
MrLinkinPark333 (talk) 00:27, 14 August 2018 (UTC) Online library/reference development[reply]
Mckensiemack (talk) 08:14, 26 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Shanluan (talk) 08:39, 26 August 2018 (UTC) However useful and needed from the list you provided. Fantastic project.[reply]
Theredproject (talk) 19:08, 26 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
--Caleidoscopic (talk) 00:01, 4 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Mardetanha ^talk 15:30, 14 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Rajeeb (talk) 12:09, 17 November 2018 (UTC) Love to help with social media, blogging, Planning, strategic development with any projects at any part of the world.[reply]
Tiputini (talk) 19:57, 8 December 2018 (UTC) coordination with Wikimujeres_Es and Viquidones UPF (in Catalan)[reply]
Youssefbhy (talk) 04:46, 24 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Pavanaja (talk) 06:15, 26 January 2019 (UTC), Karavali Wikimedians, Networking[reply]
Dhanalakshmi .K. T (talk) 15:15, 27 January 2019 (UTC), Wikiwomen Mangaluru networking, advocacy, Social media and blogging[reply]
--Alexmar983 (talk) 16:00, 17 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
DianaB (talk) 11:29, 6 March 2019 (UTC) (Supporter)[reply]
.Anja. (talk) 08:36, 10 April 2019 (UTC) French volunteer of Wikimedia Belgium[reply]
--Lokesha kunchadka (talk) 16:21, 28 June 2019 (UTC) blogger, social media.[reply]
Thais Morata (talk) Public health, women in science, equality
Wikilover90 (talk) Deconstructing the gender stereotype
Ircpresident (talk) 23:40, 23 July 2020 (UTC) (Supporter)[reply]
Filipinayzd (talk) 15:27, 19 January 2021 (UTC) (closing gender gap on content)[reply]
Chefs-kiss (talk) 0:39, 23 February 2021 (CEST) (Supporter)
Dedda71 (talk) 11:02, 27 August 2021 (UTC) From it.wiki, I'd like to help with networking, advocacy; social media, and maybe grantwriting[reply]
CoachAni (talk) 13:57, 9 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Awinebotima (talk) 12:35, 12 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Linden Liz (talk) 12:07, 12 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

In the media

Gender Diversity Visibility Community User Group Twitter Account to share information and signal boost other projects