Visibility Project

Visibility Project

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Visibility Project is a project designed to showcase the lives of remarkable African women who have demonstrated expertise relating to our three thematic areas. Showcasing them to a global audience in order to reflect the realities and lived experiences of the African women behind these successes and to inspire others by disrupting the gendered stereotyping of African women and demonstrating their contributions to key African issues and agendas. Training of female journalists and Wikipedia contributors on encyclopedic approaches to writing that contribute in-depth background reporting on the women behind the stories, thus making it easier for Wikipedians worldwide to create profiles for African women.

Background

African Women in Media, is a network for African women working in media industries anywhere in the world. Our aim is to impact positively the way media functions in relation to women, and our vision is that one day women of African heritage will be equally represented in media industries. Founded as a Facebook group in 2016, our members are made up of African women in diverse media backgrounds from factual to fictional content, marketing and communications, academia, entrepreneurship and more. As a trans-African organisation, we aim to support and collaborate with regional and national media bodies.

Wikipedia is a multilingual, web-based, free-content encyclopedia project supported by the Wikimedia Foundation and based on a model of openly editable content. It is the world's largest online encyclopedia, written collaboratively by anonymous volunteers. It was created in 2001 and as of 2015, it had recorded over 375 million visitors to the website. Wikipedia exists in over 310 languages.

Objectives

The overarching aim of this collaborative project is to increase the number of African women profiled on Wikipedia by adding an average of 330 profiles per quarter.

The objectives therefore are:

1. To showcase the lives of remarkable African women who have demonstrated expertise relating to our three thematic areas. Showcasing them to a global audience in order to reflect the realities and lived experiences of the African women behind these successes.
2. To inspire others by disrupting the gendered stereotyping of African women and demonstrating their contributions to key African issues and agendas.
3. To train female journalists and wikipedia contributors on encyclopedic approaches to writing that contribute in-depth background reporting on the women behind the stories, thus making it easier for Wikipedians worldwide to create profiles for African women.

Concept note

The problems

1. Of the approx. 90 million Nigerian women, only 1,500 (0.002 per cent) of these women are profiled on Wikipedia;
2. Less than 20% of this 0.002% have their photographs on Wikipedia under Creative Commons. This impacts the work of journalists, issues around trust and creative license. The project seeks to explore ways of encouraging the release of photos;
3. Only 1 in 10 Wikipedia contributors in Nigeria is a woman.

The solutions

1. Increasing the number of African women visible on Wikipedia;
2. Encourage journalists to do more in-depth reporting on African women, telling the story of the person behind the story;
3. Train female contributors and journalists on writing in an encyclopedic tone, and especially on women working in the following fields:

Security in Africa; Technology, particularly the fourth industrial revolution; and

Media.

Approach

1. We will work in partnership with a selected number of media, and women focused organisations, from which a selection of Wikipedians and journalists will be participants.
2. Training events will be organised in central locations to facilitate participation from neighbouring such as Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda and Burundi states;
3. Monthly editathons will be held following each zoned training, during which wikipedia profiles will be created;
4. An award system will serve as an incentive for Wikipedian and journalistic contributors. Articles submitted to Wikipedia by participants will be reviewed by a jury monthly.

See also

• Wiki4NaijaWomen