Network
Who makes up shado? Meet the visionary writers, organisers and creatives from around the world that make up the powerful and expansive shado community. Use the filter option to the left to explore the different regions and struggles that our contributors are rooted in. Our hope is that this will act as a directory as a tool for building solidarity, collaboration, and transformative change across movements.
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A Growing Culture (AGC) is a non-profit organization working to unite the food sovereignty movement. Through storytelling, AGC confronts the root causes of injustice in our food system and centers the communities who are seeding radical hope for a just and dignified future for all. By co-creating new models of knowledge and resource sharing, AGC grows the movement’s capacity to mobilize the masses and reclaim our foodways.
A. Kwizera is a passionate linguist and fashion model from Burundi. He believes that language learning is more than just memorising words: it is essential and the bridge to connect with the world. Exploring the beauty of different cultures and the ways they can bring us closer together is, he believes, a way to discover new perspectives and to open up new possibilities.
Activist
Abdul is a LGBTQI+ rights activist from Ghana who has been actively campaigning since 2014. He's currently the Communications Director for LGBT+ Rights Ghana. He prides himself in championing the rights of marginalised and vulnerable groups and truly believes it is the only way to build a better world for all.
Abdulhakeem Ibraheem Abdulkareem (AiA) is a Policy and Programs Specialist with over nine years' experience in cross-sectorial fields of Communications, Training and Development, Research, Monitoring and Evaluation and Project Management. He provides strategic management support, project coordination and evaluation to top business organisations, non-profits and government agencies. He is the Project Coordinator at Consultancy Support Services Ltd, Co-founder of Know COVID-19 Nigeria, Technical Consultant with the Business People Limited, founder of Demystifying Monitoring and Evaluations and the Lead Consultant at ScalingHeight Development Partners. He is a member of the Nigerian Association of Evaluators, Nigerian Institute of Management, Historical Society of Nigeria and the Association of Nigerian Authors.
Ada Jusic an illustrator and animator with over six years’ experience in commercial illustration and animation. As a refugee who came to the UK from Bosnia in the early 90s, art and creativity was how she made sense of her story and identity; and how she communicated it to others. Now she works to help others do the same - through making thought provoking animation and illustration that explores themes of current social issues and the lived experiences of refugees and marginalised communitites.
www.adajusic.com
@adajusic
Adam Kashmiry is a performer, experimental mover, drag artist, storyteller and a queer activist. The stage version of Adam was awarded a Fringe First, Herald Angel ward and was shortlisted for Amnesty’s International Award for Free Speech, then nominated for an Offies Award London in 2019.
Born and raised in South London, singer-songwriter ADANNAY weaves stories of Black queer joy and resistance, into bops that make you want to think, smile and dance. Playfully layering their roots in Caribbean folk and Gospel music with neo-soul vocals and an alt pop sound, ADANNAY’s songwriting is both nostalgic and fresh, soothing and forceful.
Following the release of their debut EP 'Her Favourite Song' in 2018, ADANNAY featured on BBC Introducing and performed at festivals such as Cheltenham Jazz Festival, 110 Above and Cross the Tracks. Now ADANNAY is back with a new track ‘Off My Mind’ out now.
Adele Zeynep Walton is a British-Turkish journalist and campaigner specialising in the human impacts of digital technology and social media and the author of Logging Off: The Human Cost of Our Digital World. She was formerly Dazed’s first ever political book columnist, and she has interviewed authors including Naomi Klein, George Monbiot, Angela Saini and Emma Dabiri.
Adesuwa was raised in the Nigerian state of Edo. Prior to obtaining a master’s degree in environmental quality management, she finished her undergraduate studies in Animal and Environmental Biology at the University of Benin in Nigeria. She has been passionate about human rights and the environment since she was a young girl. She has a plethora of experience in these and other fields, including leadership, sustainability, and the empowerment of women and young people. For well-known environmental organizations including Friends of the Earth, United People Global, Oba Global, and Young Friends of the Earth, she has served as a volunteer, project manager, and coordinator. She started the YESD program, which she presently directs as its Executive Director, to encourage young people to get involved in implementing the UN SDGs. Her goal is to develop initiatives that enhance people’s quality of life. fostering development through the use of creativity, problem-solving abilities, and specialist knowledge.
Ahmed Umar is a Sudanese Norwegian contemporary cross-disciplinary artist. His works recreate a narrative of his own life story utilising various techniques such as sculpture, printmaking, painting and performance. In his attempt to resolve the contradictions of living in a distant and secular place, Umar mobilises these methods to explore the complex relationship between identity, authority, sexuality, depression and art. His work is charged with social critique, a sense of directness, Arabic calligraphy and a hint of his Nubian visual heritage.
Aileen (she/her) is a writer, photographer and activist based in Scotland. Passionate about dismantling narratives of dominating and extracting nature, she set up the project Decolonising The Outdoors and organises community events. She can be found on Instagram at @aileenang_
Aimée, a Swedish-Malian foodie, is passionate about local food sovereignty, sustainable production, and preserving Black food cultures. She works with the Ghana Food Movement (GFM), a nonprofit network dedicated to building a resilient local food system that creates jobs and ensures nutritious food for all Ghanaians. A firm believer that food is political, Aimée explores the connections between cuisine, culture, and power. She travels across Africa and its diaspora, discovering foods and the rich histories behind them.
Aisha Seriki is a Nigerian, London-based creative specialising in portrait/fashion photography. At the age of 8, her family emigrated from South East Asia to the UK and she has been residing in South London ever since. Aisha’s interest in photography stems from her father's obsession with documentation; specifically that of all her significant childhood events.
Aisha’s work is inspired by both imagination and experience. Centered around global social issues, her photography addresses blackness, gender, migration, class and the myriad points of intersection within all four.
Aislinn is an illustrator based in London, whose work focuses on concepts of feminism, identity and race. Her works put Black women unapologetically in its centre, with an Afro futuristic viewpoint, highlighting the strength and beauty within Black girl magic.
Akshata Kapoor is a journalist from Mumbai, writing features articles and essays on social justice, politics and culture. She has written for AFP, Huck Magazine, gal-dem, and Varsity. She co-edits Panoramic magazine and designs the Cambridge Review of Books. Akshata is currently completing (with a lot of help from Jane Austen, Agha Shahid Ali, and Geetanjali Shree) a degree in English from Cambridge University.
Alaa Satir is Sudanese visual artist and graduate of the Architecture school at The University of Khartoum. Upon her graduation, Alaa ventured into the world of visual art becoming a self taught illustrator, street artist and political cartoonist. Her work usually offer critical insight into Sudanese society and politics while drawing inspiration from broader culture and everyday life. Photo credit: Abdel R.Abdulai
Alex Bartsch is a lens based artist based in London. His work often evolves around an exploration of the streets and the relation between the city and its people, whether through his documentary and street photography or through his project Covers, a documentation of reggae album covers and their locations in London.
Alex is a freelance designer and illustrator based in Manchester. She uses bold and playful styles to bring everything from brands, animations and charity projects to life.
Alia Romagnoli is a freelance photographer and art director. She focuses on fashion and portraiture and the concepts in her work explore her queer identity and biracial background. Alia's work has been featured on platforms such as British Vogue, VICE, Teen Vogue, The Guardian, Refinery 29 and INDIE Magazine.
Alia is a Turkish / German artist based in London who creates collages, websites, packaging, clothes and larger art pieces for a variety of brands and publications. Alia also works as a freelance visual curator for WeTransfer and frequently collaborates with other artists.
Allia is a journalist from Pakistan and an Erasmus Mundus Journalism scholar currently based in Prague, Czech Republic. She mostly writes on social issues, minorities and women's rights.
Ally is an arts and culture writer and editor. By day she works on the editorial team at Google Arts & Culture and by night she runs The Gallyry, an online magazine and community for women in the arts.
Alya Mooro is a Cairo-born, London-raised journalist. She has written for several magazines and newspapers on issues including culture, race, gender, sex, lifestyle and fashion. Alya holds a BA in Sociology and Psychology and a Masters in Journalism.
Amardeep Singh Dhillon is a queer Panjabi abolitionist writer and organiser. Their work has been featured in various outlets including the Independent, Vice, the i paper and Novara Media, as well as several books – most recently Open City's London Feeds Itself. They are a co-editor at Red Pepper magazine and organise with Lesbians and Gays Support the Migrants and South London Bartenders Network, among other groups.
Amélie Waters is a final year English Law and French Law student at King's College London. She has an interest in Human Rights and Environmental Law, with a particular focus on Climate Justice and the rights of Women and LGBTQI+ individuals. She aims to pursue her career in these areas.
Amiteshwar Singh (he/him) is an activist based in Norwich, focusing on and exploring the intersection of health justice, ecological justice and abolition. His work primarily brings forward a health perspective, working with organisations such as Health for a Green New Deal, People's Health Movement and Students for Global Health. Amit commits himself to work towards a community-led radical, joyful future, where health equity is a reality for all.
Amna Shaddad has a PhD in geometric mechanics and was former president of the Cambridge University Political Forum. She has written essays and reviews for university papers and magazines, and has been published in the quarterly print magazine, Consented. Born in Tunisia and raised in London by her Sudanese mother, she is an avid lover of progressive culture, and has a particular expertise in modern day imperialism.
Amuna Wagner is a writer and blogger who uses her platform Kandaka – www.kandaka.blog – to explore the politics of gender and intersectional feminism through art. She is interested in intercultural creative knowledge production and decolonial feminist approaches to society and education.
Amy is a Social Geography graduate based in Glasgow, Scotland. Her work explores multiple forms of social and political injustice, with a focus on community impacts of austerity policies in the UK, and community organising as a form of resistance. She has recently entered youth support work and mentoring, supporting young people to realise their potential and unlock positive futures.
Amy-Louise Merron is an Irish feminist, activist, mother & chairperson of Ulster University Pro-Choice Society.
Ana Llaveria is a Spanish artist based in Brussels. Inspired by critical anti-capitalistic theory, feminism and human-animal behaviour, she tries to delve into a more personal approach. The care of the local versus the global, the cultural versus the economic and the felt versus the thought. Drawing is her main expression tool, from static drawings to animations, she's passionate about the world of Chinese ink and its multiple outcomes.
Ananya is a feminist artist, historian and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu practitioner based in London. She started painting seriously in November 2018 whilst being house-bound due to a brain injury (post-concussion syndrome). Using painting as a way to heal herself, Ananya is always looking for the next opportunity to translate political issues that matter to her into art. She primarily paints women of colour, using art to examine different gendered and racialised realities that shape their lived experiences. Her paintings depict women of colour as masters of their own narratives and histories, rather than muses or objects.
André is a Liverpool-based decolonial artist and activist of Afro-Jamaican descent whose work seeks to illuminate and challenge the downpression of the Babylon systems which bound the ways we imagine the world and our place in it. Since organising with Rhodes Must Fall in Oxford, he has played a significant role in the development of People & Planet’s Divest Borders campaign, through which UK students are demanding that their universities sever ties with the border industry.
Andreea is a digital rights campaigner, currently managing the public mobilisation efforts of EDRi, a network of 45 digital rights NGOs. She reads about moral judgement, and what divides /unites people. Andreea hopes her energy helps build a dignifying future digital society that works for all – not for the few.
Andrew is a writer, artist, organiser, and YouTuber born and raised in Trinidad & Tobago. As an ardent anarchist and firm believer in power to the people, Andrew aims to invigorate imaginations and encourage people to create a better world in the shell of the old.
Angel Arutura is a student activist and anti-racism educator based in Belfast, Northern Ireland. She is currently studying a BSc in Geographical sciences, and she is passionate about advocating for a more sustainable future and social justice. You can follow her work on her instagram @angelarutura
Ania is an illustrator from Maryland mainly focusing on women's empowerment, mental health awareness, fashion, and beauty. She graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with a Bachelors in Illustration with extended studies in Fashion. Her work primarily consists of bright colours, strong patterns, and graphic figures.
Anmol is a Muslim Pakistani journalist who’s work focuses on marginalised narratives within gender justice, climate and media.
Anna Maria Ohan Guzelian is a Syrian-Armenian journalist, based in Lebanon. She is a reporter for the Spanish News Agency, EFE and has worked as a researcher for several Human rRghts organizations. Anna Maria has been working on raising awareness on the socio-economic situation within Syria and participating in several EU talks to advocate for it. She also works with a feminist organization, Haven for Artists, working at the intersection of arts and activism.
Anna is born and raised in North London. She loves discovering all kinds of music and books. Any green space makes her happy. She is an aspiring writer, and a self proclaimed history nerd. In the past few months, her eating disorder has enhanced a new fascination with psychology, to the point of analysing all her friends dreams. Mediation has been a newfound blessing to ground her with grateful acceptance of her circumstances and feelings. She thinks everyone should repeat one uplifting affirmation in their mirror.
Anna graduated in 2018 from Cambridge in Architecture and is now working at an architecture practice in London. Her creative interests also extend to textiles, illustration and graphic design.
Annette Pérez is an illustrator and activist based in Bogotá, Colombia. She's also the creator of Afronteradas, a digital project looking at history and decolonial perspectives about race, gender, class, cultural phenomena and diasporic heritage. She's passionate about poetry, spaces of dialogue and visual work, and hopeful about international solidarity and finding ways to keep savouring life.
Various writers from various countries who, for personal reasons including safety, wish to remain anonymous.
The Anonymous Arab.
Anu is associate director of Rocks and the founder and co-director of Skin Deep, a collective that makes space for Black creatives and creatives of colour to work towards justice through cultural production.
Asia Khatun is a freelance writer and poet. When she isn't writing, she is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of online literary magazine Thawra.
Asmaa is a Palestinian researcher and organiser based in London. Her work focuses on connecting Palestinian and climate struggles through an anti-imperialist framework.
Astarte Cara is a self-taught multi-disciplinary based in Manchester, United Kingdom. In 2019, she graduated from Islington Mill Art Academy, a free peer led D.I.Y art school based in Salford. Her practice is informed by an ethnographic and anthropological approach, addressing topics including dual-heritage identity, mental health and dreams.
Athulya Pillai is an illustrator and storyteller, documenting people, places and creatures. Currently living, drawing and thinking in Bangalore. A lot of her work focuses on wildlife conservation, documentation.
Aude Abou Nasr is a Beirut-based illustrator and photographer. Her work bears witness of what surrounds her, whether it comes to social issues, the communities she belongs to, or simply nocturnal imageries and the melancholy of her people.
Instagram: @ahlan.my.darlings and website: audenasr.com
Aya Bseiso is a Palestinian researcher and artist based in Jordan. Her work is concerned with investigating settler-colonial extractivist projects, specifically on the politics of water, agriculture and energy infrastructures, supply chains, and logistical flows in both Palestine and Jordan. She is a co-founding member of the artist-led research collective Bahaleen, engaged in a constellation of projects, residencies, and studies that unearth the long history of acts of resistance, disruption, dismemberment, and reappropriation of settler colonial infrastructures from the perspective of the saboteur, smuggler, and guerrilla movements.
Aya Mobaydeen is an illustrator based in Amman, Jordan. She is curious and eager to always explore and dabble different fields, which has helped her figure out my interests, that being a deep passion in illustration. Her work is inspired by people, nature, animals and everything around her. She loves working with colours that work well together. She also focuses on the details and uses a lot of repetitive elements. She believes that reflecting her emotions, experiences and memories into her art makes it meaningful and impactful.
Ayman Alhussein is a Syrian photographer and filmmaker based in London.
B. Brenner is a writer and student from New York City. She's written about the environment, queerness, and mental health. She has collaborated with organizations like PERIOD, has co-hosted an event for MTV, and has also done trend forecasting and consulting.
Banseka Kayembe is a freelance writer and creator and Editor in Chief of Naked Politics, a website to engage young people in politics.
Bao's work is expressly political, questioning the ways in which the casteist Indian society functions, and particularly how Dalit women are perceived and treated. Through her illustrations and art, she challenges the audience to reconsider the ways in which Dalit women are presented and represented from the brahminical gaze of objectification and fetishization. With her feet firmly grounded in anti-caste politics, Bao has stayed true to the credos of Phule and Ambedkar's teachings.
Beauty Dhlamini is a critical global health scholar, with a focus on addressing health inequalities in local and global contexts. She is also the co-host of the podcast, Mind the Health Gap.
A queer illustrator currently based in London, Bee uses their platform and art to educate, empower and inform folks on a range of important topics including mental health, LGBTQ+ and anti-racism to name a few. As well as creating incredible art, Bee has just completed their degree in Illustration at Edinburgh University. Profile photography by Charlie Hyams.
Ben is a non binary writer, content creator, and LGBTQIA Activist. They aim to uplift and educate through media. They run their own website, are the host of The Happy Place podcast, and deliver education & laughter daily via their legendary Instagram Stories. They are currently writing their debut book.
blkmoodyboi is a Non-binary Afro-Indigenous Caribbean self taught illustrator living in London. Their art centres Black and Brown trans people. They draw QTIBIPOC in joy, abundance and as part of struggle and political resistance.
Boe is a queer illustrator of colour and interdisciplinary creative based in London, UK. They were raised in Eastbourne, UK and moved back to London in 2018 to pursue a career in illustration. Their work explores themes of queerness and intersectionality, focusing on activism for People of Colour and the LGBTQ+ community. They describe their work as a mix of contemporary illustration with influences from nature, tattoo culture and alternative fashion. Boe is self-taught in a range of mediums, starting with watercolour painting at a young age and later finding interest in illustration and needlework. Their artistic goals and aspirations include tattooing and murals. They currently exhibit their work online (boestudios.square.site) and at a range of markets in London.
Bougi is an Algerian Paris-based artist and activist, using sketches as a powerful medium of expression. Through his artwork, he captures and conveys emotions, ideas, and social commentary, always striving to make a meaningful impact.
Brendon Holder is a Canadian-born writer based in New York with work in The Globe and Mail, Electric Literature, The Drift and elsewhere. He was recently a Fiction Finalist for the Metatron Prize for Rising Authors.
Brooke is a queer student living in London who is passionate about intersectionality within the LGBTQI+ community. In their work, they aim to highlight the unique experiences of LGBTQ+ BIPOC whilst simultaneously trying to connect with their own queer British-Asian identity.
Canela Laude-Arce is a French-Peruvian photographer and writer, working on stories related to feminism, gender and political activism. She is currently based in Paris. She holds a BA in Comparative Literature and Film Studies from King's College London, and a MSc in Conflict, Rights and Justice from SOAS University of London. In 2021, she graduated from a photojournalism and documentary photography course at the EMI-Cfd school in Paris. She takes a particular interest in stories related to Latin America and to the Latin American diaspora.
Carina is a Brooklyn-based photographer, director, and musician working across many mediums to elevate and share the work of her own and others. She shoots primarily on 35mm and 120mm film and believes love is the answer.
Carolina is freelance writer and journalist based in London, who often writes about the relationship between the arts, social justice, politics and identity. Her work has most recently been featured in Wonderland and Rollacoaster.
Caroline Lenette was born in Mauritius and migrated to Australia in 2005. She enjoys writing short stories and poetry to complement her work as an academic at the University of New South Wales, Sydney. Caroline’s book, 'Arts-based methods in refugee research: Creating sanctuary' is about art, storytelling and forced migration.
Cat is an actor, writer, author, gender advisor to the UN & founder/CEO of award-winning Kusini Productions, a company established to create opportunities, change the narrative and champion voices of Black women and girls. She is proud to be both state school educated and an Oxford University alumni – and especially of writing her thesis on Beyoncé (and getting a first!) Cat is very proud to be an Ambassador for PAPYRUS, the UK’s National Charity for the Prevention of Young Suicide.
Chanté Timothy is a freelance illustrator based in London. Chanté's work often focuses on diversity and inclusion using bright bold colours and expressive characters.
Charity Atukunda is a visual artist, passionate about drawing and digital illustration. Her work often explores and questions the ideas, beliefs and systems that govern our lives. She currently resides on Kampala, Uganda.
Strongly influenced by her upbringing as a bi-racial woman growing up in a predominantly white area in South Dakota, Charlie uses her work to make sense of the dichotomy between how she experienced the world and how the world experienced her through the lenses of race and gender. Her thematic explorations of identity and representation become strikingly clear in powerful film and photography work, as well as branded content for clients including Target, Google, Calvin Klein, GE, Narciso Rodriguez, The New York Times, and more. Charlie recently released her first feature film, the pandemic thriller "Before the Fire" which is available now on all streaming platforms as well as in select theatres.
Charlotte is a freelance writer and climate justice campaigner. She is interested in culture that explores social (in)justices and believes it is one of the most powerful tools at our disposal to create meaningful change.
Charlotte is a freelance photojournalist/filmmaker and the co-founder of TimePeace App. She has been published in Time Magazine, Vice, The Independent, Monocle, Suitcase and The Moscow Times among others – her area of focus is around humanitarian and feminist issues with a specific interest in migration. She believes that through film and photography one can change the world and inspire others to question or challenge the status quo.
Charlotte Parker is a British graphic designer and Illustrator currently based in Berlin, Germany. Charlotte studied Graphic Design at York St John University and during her time there, developed a profound interest in illustration. Obsessed with brighter tones and organic shapes, Charlotte's work draws from daily surveillance of humans and characters, women in particular. Her main focus is to spread positivity and mental health awareness through her drawings and happy-minded drawing style.
Charlotte Rose is an independent researcher, writer and organiser based in London. She is a co-founder and lead researcher at WeSmellGas (a pan-European activist collective resisting neocolonial gas expansion). Here she works with grassroots activists and scholars across the Eastern Mediterranean to uncover its ‘Gas Industrial Complex’. She is also a researcher and organiser at Disrupt Power: a Palestinian-led collective of activists, artists, researchers and architects investigating the ‘fuelers’ genocide, supporting grassroots groups to impose an energy embargo from below – until Palestine is Free.
Chela Yego is an award-winning contemporary collage artist and illustrator based in Nairobi. Her work is drawn from her love for storytelling. Collage, illustration, mixed media, and self-portraiture have been mediums she uses to express her intersectional experience and cultural identity through visual storytelling. Chela also co-founded Hawa Binti Artists, a community that offers communal care for women and non-binary visual artists in Kenya.
Chelsea McDonagh is a researcher, Irish Traveller activist and writer. She speaks on a wide range of issues affecting Gypsy and Traveller people including education, health, policy and politics. Chelsea is one of the co-founders of the Rom Belong programme, a KCL Widening Participation programme for Gypsy, Roma and Traveller pupils and is passionate about improving opportunities for young people.
Cherie is a freelance illustrator based in Birmingham with a visual language that is influenced by her Hong Kong heritage. She enjoys incorporating vivid colour palettes and layered textures into her work to capture various topics such as cultural identity, mental health, history, and nature. Her practice consists of editorial, advertising, publishing, and community-based projects. Alongside her illustration practice, she enjoys creating and leading creative workshops, as well as delivering talks at educational institutions.
Chioma Ince is a freelance Illustrator from South London who is interested in exploring themes of politics, identity and most importantly creating and bringing to life vibrant and playful narratives. She is currently a mentee on Pathways: into Children’s Publishing, a program run by House of illustration and Pop Up Projects, and is passionate about changing the 2017 static that only 1% of more than 9,000 books published in the UK had a central BAME character.
Chioma Opara is a proud Nigerian-British storyboard artist, illustrator and workshop facilitator. She was born and bred in London, where she is now based. She has also lived in The Netherlands, Spain, Italy, The Basque Country and Germany. And she is super passionate about accessible content and amplifying underrepresented stories. She usually depicts experiences of struggle, triumphs and daily life. She is also a professional geek and a human drinks lover.
Christina Atik is a graphic designer by day and illustrator (very late) at night based in Beirut, Lebanon. Her work often addresses issues related to women's sexuality, societal restrictions and beauty standards in the Arab world.
Cindy Kang is a New York-based artist from Seoul, South Korea. Since graduating from the School of Visual Arts with a BFA in Illustration, she has created artworks for a diverse array of clients. Her colourful works combine organic textures with vibrant palettes, conveying warmth and reverie.
Claude is a digital marketer, artist, model and body positivity activist living in Hackney. Her writing aims to challenge people's ideas, provide comfort for those who relate to her words, and shed light on the issues faced by marginalised folk.
Culture Workers for PACBI are a UK-based collective of writers working to encourage small and indie publishers, book sellers and venues to commit to PACBI.
Daisy is a visual artist born and raised on Detroit's westside, currently based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her work aims to humanise the black body by highlighting the wonders and the struggles of the Black experience.
@daizydoodles
daisyillustrations.com
Dalia Al-Dujaili is an Iraqi-British writer, editor and producer based in London. She tells stories from the SWANA region and diaspora and reports on community-led stories from the margins. Her writing has appeared in The Guardian, Huck, The New Arab among others. Dalia is the Digital Editor of AZEEMA Magazine and the founder of The Road to Nowhere magazine. She has worked with migrant charities including Paper Airplanes, Restless Beings, Counterpoints, Gaza Library, the IRC and The Migrant Rights Network. In 2023 she was the Producer of Refugee Week. Dalia holds a first-class degree in English Literature from the University of Edinburgh.
Dan is an occasional writer and the editor of soon-to-launch food journalism magazine, Sliced.
Danielle is a neuroscientist and environmental justice activist from London, based in Germany. She has previously organised with Pass the Mic Climate, Health for Future Magdeburg and Kill the Bill, and has spoken on panels with Re-Earth Initiative, Bad Activist Collective, My Life My Say and more. Danielle works with GreenpeaceUK on their social media to raise awareness about various climate-related issues and currently organises with #StopCambo. Her work focuses on intersectional climate justice that benefits both people and the planet.
Dante is a thinker and video creator who believes that Socialism is good, actually!
Dar Al Naim is a young Sudanese artist. The work she creates demonstrates a dynamic look into her nomadic, Afro-politan and diasporic way of life. Her compulsive need to produce shows in her extensive body of work and the multiple subjects she is continually researching. Her colourful illustrations; paintings; textile work; prints; and black and white ink drawings alike are detailed, obsessive, free and full of Sudanese cultural and symbolic connotations.
Daria is a Ukrainian product designer, illustrator and artist. She graduated from the Kharkiv Academy of Design and Arts with a degree in industrial design which gave her structuring skills and helped to organise her artistic passions. She is a resident of the virtual "GARELEYA NEOTODRYOSH," an anti-exhibition space that installs expositions in ruined buildings and shows artists who are not wanted to be allowed on the glossy parquets of Ukrainian museums.
Darío Karim Pomar Azar is a Palestinian-Spanish writer and organiser, with an undergraduate degree in law and a postgraduate degree in urban sociology. Darío has mostly written on Palestine, settler-colonialism and anti-colonial resistance, and has a particular interest in spatial politics and Palestinian urbanity. Darío has also published on the policing of pro-Palestinian protests in the UK and the logics of student repression in Western universities. Alongside a continuing interest in academic research and writing, Darío also organises with various organisations struggling for Palestine’s liberation.
Davina Bacon is a writer, student, and activist based in Cornwall. They are currently completing English and Environmental Science degree. Her written work, which mostly consists of short stories, poetry, and personal essays, explore the intersections of cultural and environmental issues and their impacts. Davina is passionate about community-based justice work, and this has led her to be a part of several initiatives, including co-hosting the When Oceans Rise podcast.
Deborah is a social media creative and writer who uses the power of storytelling to advocate for change. She has volunteered with both local and International organisations such as 360 awareness, we make change, iAscend, ONE, Care2people and Femme lead. Deborah aims to make impact with one step at a time. She believes in furnishing young people with the skills they need to assess opportunities for their future.
Dyslexic writer, Grime poet, working-class academic, pansexual ex-Mormon and Bashment dancing social activist from the seam between East London and Essex, Debris has no choice but to explore the intersectional, unexpected and unjust – it’s not just who she is, it’s her responsibility in a world that all too often summarises us into a caption. When Debris isn’t writing, speaking, teaching or performing, she can also often be found dancing to Grime, Soca, Afrobeats and Dancehall for organisations such as The Heatwave and Red Bull Music Academy.
Deenah is a journalist, activist and poet with bylines in Lacuna Magazine, The Metro and PinkNews. She writes about LGBTQ issues through an intersectional lens, taking into account religion, race, class and much more.
Diana Morales is a P'urhépecha artist born in Santa Cruz Tanaco, Michoacan, Mexico raised in Santa Ana, California unceded Tongva territory. She is a UCSC alum and is currently on her journey as an educator at UCLA Masters in Ed Teacher Education Program. She is the creator of Arte es Medicina, a digital platform dedicated to sharing P'urhépecha oral stories and collective efforts through art. Diana creates her artwork to celebrate and bring visibility to P'urhépecha communities in the diaspora. As an artist, Diana believes creative work is powerful and sacred. Reimagining our world and strengthening our collective memory through visual art is medicine.
Dionise Vargas is a multidisciplinary queer artist, Indigenous and racialised, based in Chile, known for their work in collage, electronic music, and activism. Their artistic practice moves between the visual and the sonic, with a vibrant aesthetic that mixes surrealism, the political, and the corporeal.
Dionne is a freelance illustrator based in Manchester, she works with a mixture of handmade textures and digital drawing, and is obsessive about colour. Dionne works on all kinds of illustration projects from editorial to publishing to pattern design. Her favourite projects are the ones that confront social, environmental or political issues and help improve the world in some small way. She has an MA in Visual Communication and a BA in illustration. Dionne is a dog person.
Do The Green Thing is a public service for the planet that uses creativity to tackle climate change.
Dominique is a climate justice activist and organiser in Fridays for Future International and Climate Live. Her activism is focused on mobilising people for the climate, organising climate strikes, and various international actions and campaigns, including utilising music and creative means to outreach to people. She is a public speaker on environmental justice that is interlinked with social issues and has spoken at events such as the UN Climate Change Conference in 2019 and the New York Times Hub on a panel at COP26 hosted by Emma Watson. For Dominique, fighting for climate justice that benefits people and the planet is crucial. She campaigns for bold and systemic action from global leaders.
Aviah's research is informed by their work and activism of domestic violence, integrating theory and practice with the express goal of furthering social justice. This maps across academic, teaching and activist commitments.
Before academic life Aviah held a number of front-line domestic violence service roles, including working as an Independent Domestic and Sexual Violence Advocate, Refuge Worker and National Domestic Violence Helpline Worker. Aviah is also a member of Sisters Uncut – a national direct-action collective fighting cuts to domestic violence services and state violence, as well as the London Renters Union – a members led tenants union.
Dr Gemma Bird is a Senior Lecturer in Politics and IR at the University of Liverpool. As an activist-scholar, her research sits at the intersection between political theory and International Relations, focusing recently on migration, humanitarianism and advocating for a radically different approach to global borders and displacement. She has recently published in the journals Geopolitics, Global Policy, Cooperation and Conflict and Citizenship Studies.
Dr. Krizun Loganathan is an Emergency Medicine doctor based in Liverpool. He undertakes advocacy work in the realm of immigration and the rights of BAME healthcare workers.
Dr. Yara Hawari is a Palestinian academic and writer. Currently, she is the Senior Analyst of Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network. She completed her PhD in Middle East Politics at the University of Exeter, where she taught various undergraduate courses and continues to be an honorary research fellow. In addition to her academic work, which focused on indigenous studies and oral history, she is a frequent political commentator writing for various media outlets including The Guardian, Foreign Policy, and Al Jazeera English. In 2021 she published her debut novella 'The Stone House' and she is also the host of the podcast 'Rethinking Palestine'.
Kalakal (Driss Chaoui) is a France-based illustrator with a sharp interest in the queer Muslim identity, and an emphasis on colour.
Ed Faulkner is co-founder of Sapling Spirits and an environmental activist. He is committed to reforestation with a focus on urban areas and community involvement. Having completed an MSc in Environmental Politics he also writes articles promoting sustainable practices and ideas.
Illustrator
Edita Kelsey is a British Fashion Designer, illustrator and creative; currently based and working in Stockholm, Sweden.
She is a graduate from both the University of Westminster and Central Saint Martins UAL.
She has experience in many creative mediums, across fashion, illustration, graphics, styling and writing.
Edith Ault is a London/Glasgow based illustrator and animator. She is currently in her final year of Communication Design at Glasgow School of Art.
Edo Oliver is a creative from Mexico City, Montreal and Tokyo. Studying Economics and East Asian Studies at McGill University he is now continuing his academics at Bunka Fashion College in Fashion Design. While working as a stylist for magazines and fashion company SSENSE, he has simultaneously developed himself as a photographer. Though interested by many topics, his goal is to capture a sensibility and vulnerability in his works that connect people regardless of medium.
Elceta is a Jamaican Lesbian mother. She has lived in Germany for two years and six months. Because of her own experiences as a SOGI claimant, she is interested in what can be done to improve the lives of all SOGI claimants in Europe.
Elia J. Ayoub is a UK-based writer and researcher. He holds a PhD in Cultural Analysis from the University of Zurich on postwar Lebanon and an MA on the politics of Hebrew and Yiddish. He is the founder of The Fire These Times podcast and co-founder of From The Periphery media collective. He blogs at www.Iwritestuff.blog and can be found on Twitter, Mastodon, Bluesky and Instagram.
Elif Sarican is a writer, organiser, curator, and translator who collaborates with cultural institutions and universities around the world. As an independent researcher, she has worked on parliamentary inquiries and with artists to explore and preserve depictions of Kurdish life. Elif is an author of edited volume 'She Who Struggles: Revolutionary Women Who Shaped The World' and guest editing a special issue for Barnard College's S&F Online journal titled 'Rage, Struggle, Freedom: Politics of Hope and Love,' set to be published in 2024. She is the Curatorial and Community manager of Left Book Club, a historic radical publisher in the UK established in 1936.
Elizabeth McBride is a student studying German and Russian. She is based in the UK and interested in all things related to languages, social media and politics.
Eli Virkina is a passionate audiovisual storyteller, advocate for Indigenous rights and climate justice, and community organiser from the Venecia Derecha Kichwa Community on the Napo River in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Through the Iyarina Center for Learning, her family-led initiative, she dedicates herself to preserving Indigenous languages and culture while exploring equitable and sustainable solutions for the future of the Amazon Rainforest. Along with her family, she safeguards key forests of bio-cultural significance with a focus on fostering “sumak kawsay,” the Kichwa philosophy of “living well” where families and forests are taken care of and take care of each other – key to this are women, caretakers, and givers of life.
Ella King is an award-winning Singaporean novelist living in London. She read Philosophy and Theology at Oxford University and is a corporate lawyer. Her debut novel BAD FRUIT was released in hardback in August 2022 and received rave reviews from the likes of the Observer, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle, Grazia and Red.
Ellen Miles is an activist, strategist and writer from East London. She's the founder of Nature is a Human Right (the campaign for the United Nations to recognise nature contact as a universal right) and Dream Green, a social enterprise that empowers people to become guerrilla gardeners. Her book, Nature is a Human Right – an anthology of original writing from the campaign's supporters, including Dr Qing Li, Ron Finley, Jay Griffiths, Nick Hayes and Queer Nature – has been described as "a vital and timely manifesto for environmental equality."
Eloise Moench is a London based writer. She has completed a masters degree in environmental ethics and has since gone on to work in communications for a large reforestation project taking place in Brazil (The Black Jaguar Foundation).
Elspeth Merry started her career in journalism, working for the Sunday Times before realising her true love of music and becoming music editor of 1883 Magazine. With a grasp on the media landscape and interest in the music industry, Elspeth moved into Publicity and started representing artists at inside/out. After two years she joined Island Records as Junior Publicist, then rejoined inside/out to become Head of Publicity. Underpinning her work is a love of storytelling, the belief in the power of the written word, and women’s empowerment in the workplace, which led to Elspeth co-founding Her Hustle.
Em Cohen writes about Jews, Zionism, philosemitism and anti-Semitism.
Em Tetrapod (pseudonym) is a teacher writing through the lens of the complexities of being an educator with radical views.
Emilie is an illustrator based in Brussels. Passionate by myths and legends, botany, ethology, feminism... She aims to express her convictions and dreams through her work. Deeply curious of the natural world, ecological alternatives, and the richness of the world's cultures, she found inspiration lost in the wilderness, books or podcasts, learning about fascinating places and people, rebellious plants and mystical animals.
Emily Galea is a Maltese feminist writer and President of Young Progressive Beings, an NGO fighting for reproductive rights in Malta. She is also the co-project lead of Dear Decision Makers, a storytelling campaign and publication that shows the suffering caused by the blanket ban in Malta. She is passionate about achieving reproductive rights in Malta and correcting gender injustice.
Emma is co-convenor of Alliance for Choice and a core campaigner since 2011, helping secure decriminalisation of abortion. She actively supports women and pregnant people through their abortions as a doula with Lucht Cabhrach. Emma is completing her practice-based PhD addressing photography as an activist tool for abortion rights, at Ulster University. Emma is also a member of the Turner Prize winning Array Collective and has exhibited in international solo and group shows.
Emma Collier is a driven storyteller with a diverse career in journalism and TV. She began her career reporting on underrepresented issues, including groundbreaking coverage of endometriosis, which led to national attention and became a headline story. Emma has appeared on BBC Woman's Hour advocating for change in how people with endometriosis are treated. Now part of the 2025 Women in Film and TV cohort, Emma is dedicated to promoting equity and leadership in the media industry.
Emma de Saram is a climate and health justice activist who is focused on building community with students, trade unions and campaign groups advocating for radical social change with sustainability and care as her guiding principles. Emma is also the President of the University of Exeter Students Union and a trustee of SOS-UK, where she is working with the national student movement. Since her diagnosis with Type 1 diabetes, Emma has been raising awareness of the intersections between climate, mental and physical health, and the urgent need for equitable access to healthcare supplies.
Emma May Piper is a passionate designer, list maker and go-getter. She strives to push the boundaries of graphic design through the use of unusual mediums and create fun ideas that will benefit the planet, one project at a time. With her pen in one and paint in the other she aspires to master everything the design world has to offer and wishes to put a smile on people's faces along the way.
Enas Satir is a Sudanese visual artist who currently lives in Toronto. Her main focus is cultural projects revolving around race, blackness and African identity. She has recently started working on ceramics with ceramic artist Erin Candela, after winning a joint art grant from Toronto Art Council.
Most of her art is inspired by the complexity and beauty of her background and country of Sudan.
Energy Embargo for Palestine is an anti-imperialist climate collective based in Britain, responding to the call issued by Palestinian trade unions to disrupt energy flow to and from Israel and the global energy market.
Esther is a homemaker and mother to four children. She is a campaigner with lived experience of the asylum system. She's also a member of Action Group on NRPF under Praxis Organisation and Refugee Ambassador 2022.
Esther is a French illustrator. She juggles between creating editorial and brands work and painting naked women.She loves to draw characters and she's interested in the representation of identities, relationships and sexuality. Her style is colourful, whimsical and expressive, and she is obsessed with hands, faces and breasts.
Eugénie is an independent journalist, film-maker and educator of French nationality. During the past 10 years, she has been working in Mexico, the US and France with individuals, groups, families, neighborhoods and communities of colour, Indigenous people, migrants, farmworkers, students and labourers in resistance against colonialism, extractivism, racism and gender violence in rural and urban areas. She considers communication as a powerful tool for exchange, learning, collective organisation and solidarity building throughout the world.
Fairuza Hanun is a writer and educator in the art of literacy. Through their work in program development at Jakarta-based literacy academy Indonesia Writing Edu Center and their involvement in youth community forums, they organise for affirming childhood care via alternative narrative education.
Fernanda Peralta is an illustrator based in São Paulo. Since 2017 she has worked as an illustrator, artist and designer, solving problems and translating concepts and ideas into a visual language. In her work, the composition is perceived as almost real, but the elements and general sensation evoke a somewhat fantastic feeling, slightly unlikely or inexplicable. The ordinary is one of her main inspirations to create: she draws what she sees in front of her, but also what she finds in dreams and in the fantastical world of imagination.
Fiona Quadri is a visual artist, community archivist, and the founder of Zinetopia, a platform for critical creative workshops. Drawing on her background in Postcolonial Studies, Fiona explores Displacement, Community, and Race through QUEER (and) BIPOC experiences, using illustration and collage to challenge dominant narratives and shape belonging.
Florence Wildblood is a journalist covering media, climate and corruption – primarily for Byline Investigates / Expose News, where she researches and edits writing on the history of criminality in the tabloid press. You can follow her on Twitter.
Fopé Ajanaku is a culture writer, facilitator, and campaigner with over a decade of experience working across political spheres. A self-described socialite and reluctant writer, Fopé believes that good prose should feel like a long, slow exhale. They live in London, spending most of their days reflecting on the last time they were touched, untangling the small caresses of intimacy that underpin our identities. Their work, featured in Dazed, The FACE, i-D, Stylist, and The Guardian, spans black pasts and futures, queer life, sex, and relationships.
Fozia Ismail is a researcher, creative producer and artist. She is the founder of Arawelo Eats, a platform for exploring politics, identity, and colonialism through East African food and what it means for our understanding of belonging in a post-Brexit world. When not critically eating her way through life's messiness she can be found be found plotting at the Pervasive Media Studio and Spike Island with Ayan Cilmi as part of Dhaqan Collective, a Somali feminist art collective in Bristol.
Francesca is a community organiser and writer. She has worked in the migrants' rights sector since 2020, leading advocacy and campaigns for undocumented Filipino migrants and coordinating a network of French, Belgian, and British organisations working at the shared border. She co-developed Our Place Is Here: a campaign, documentary, and podcast about migrant domestic workers' rights. Her writing has been published by gal-dem and openDemocracy. She writes the newsletter sa hangganan about diaspora, history, and migration.
Francisca Rockey is an award-winning geographer and campaigner who is regularly involved in social campaigns, and charity fundraising. She is also a writer and public speaker featured in mainstream and online media. Francisca is the founder of Black Geographers, a community interest company working to tackle the erasure of black people in geography by creating a platform for black geographers to network and connect. The platform has a global audience of over 10,000 members.
Georgia is a Cardiff-based writer and filmmaker, whose favourite topics are queerness, gender, faith, and the ways in which people navigate complex identities in the current political landscape.
Gervaise Alexis Savvias is a Zambian-Cypriot writer, artist and researcher currently based in Nicosia, Cyprus. Their practice is predicated on an entanglement of poetic narratives, a radical archival methodology, and thoughts that emerge while lounging in the sun. Their work stretches across installation, poetry, critique, collective utterance, and sound.
Campaigner, speaker and writer Gina Martin is an advocate for creating change in communities for equal rights. Following on from her national campaign to make upskirting illegal and changing the English and Welsh law by creating the Voyeurism Act she has since changed Instagram’s global policy on breast squeezing which was disproportionately censoring plus-sized black women. Gina is also a regular consultant for companies and educates schools across the UK.
Hana Fujii Bennet is a recent university graduate with an interest in the role of music in culture and society. Drawing from her own mixed Japanese and British background as well as third-culture upbringing, she has explored the many facets of identity construction in music, and hopes to contribute to movements that bring together different artistic cultures towards social justice and empowerment.
Hannah El-Hitami is an Egyptian-German freelance journalist based in Berlin. Her work focuses on migration and international law with particular interest in the region of West Asia and North Africa.
Hannah is a food grower and facilitator based in London. She has been working in urban community food growing projects for the last ten years, and currently works for Granville Community Kitchen and the Landworkers Alliance. She is interested in the social infrastructure and ecological interdependence that these projects create, and is optimistic about their potential to create social justice, liberation and the path to a climate safe future.
Hannah is an actor and writer living in North London. She trained at the Drama Centre and has been twice nominated for the Ian Charleson Award for roles at the RSC and National Theatre. Ceres is her first short film script.
Harpreet Kaur Paul is a human rights lawyer, organiser, writer and PhD candidate on climate justice at Warwick Law School. She co-leads the Care & Repair work at Tipping Point UK.
Hasheemah Afaneh, MPH is a Palestinian-American writer and public health professional based in New Orleans. Her work centers on social justice and various intersections related to it. You can find some of her work in Sinking City Literary Magazine, The Markaz Review, 580 Split Magazine, Glass Poetry Poets Resist Series, Poets Reading the News, This Week in Palestine, and others.
Hayfaa Chalabi is an illustrator and storyteller interested in the study of governmental restrictions of democratic practices and the role of illustration to re-contextualise narratives, histories, and discussions. She graduated with a BFA in Visual Communication + Change from Linnaeus University and an MFA in Visual Communication from Konstfack. Hayfaa uses her power as an illustrator and storyteller to raise awareness about different socio-political issues. Her work revolves mainly around the misuse of power structures in our society and the intersections of visual culture, gender, and migration.
Healing Justice Ldn (HJL) builds community-led health and healing to create capacity for personal and structural transformation. They work on a community, structural and movement level to repair and build the conditions for health and healing justice that dignify and support all of us to be well. Using a multi-layered multi-systems approach and cultural strategy, they work to disarm the cycles of harm, ill-health and chronic unsustainability that oppression reproduces in our communities and social justice movements. They nurture cultures towards futures free from intimate, interpersonal and structural violence.
Health Workers for a Free Palestine (UK) is a collective of health workers, patients and allies fighting for Palestinian liberation through the lens of health justice, formed in response to calls for solidarity from health unions in Palestine and the Palestinian people.
Henry Roberts is a writer and photographer originally from Lancashire now based in South-East London. His work explores the intersection between art and activism. He has written for The Guardian, Verso, Observer, Little White Lies and A Rabbit's Foot, among other publications. Alongside his freelance work, Henry also works part-time in the NGO sector, promoting ethical storytelling and helping international charities gain media coverage.
Holly Hudson is a queer social and climate justice activist and writer based in London. She holds an MA in Social Anthropology from SOAS where she specialised in decolonial, anti-carceral movements in the UK. She was an organiser with the COP26 Coalition on their People’s Summit in Glasgow and is currently organising with Green New Deal Rising UK and ‘We Smell Gas’ a new decolonial network of activists, researchers and filmmakers campaigning against new pipeline proposals.
Hyally Carvalho has been a climate activist since 2019. She is from the Northeast of Brazil and volunteers with Fridays for Future and Engajamundo.
Ibukun Jesusanmi Baldwin is a multidisciplinary artist and social practitioner specialising in print, illustration and embroidery. Ibukun founded the Bukky Baldwin company out of a growing awareness of the neglected needs of marginalised communities and also the amazing potential within the creative industry to help. She is determined to use this company as a tool and champion for positive socio-economic change.
Ife Grillo is a freelance creative, poet, writer and presenter.
Ifeoluwa Olutayo is a writer and filmmaker. Born in Lagos, Nigeria, he has been passionate about telling stories from as far back as he can remember. He is an avid lover of Cinema, books and music and his writing has been published in Getunruly, The Republic and 49th Street among others. He has lost many arguments defending the recent The Arctic Monkeys album release.
Igor Vieira is an Environmental Engineer with a postgraduate degree in Oceanography and Master’s degree in Environmental Engineering. He is interested in water and climate advocacy.
Ilayda McIntosh is a writer and photographer. Her interests include arts/culture, race relations, gender relations & left-wing activism. Her poetry is a mixture of both spoken word & written prose. She specialises in portrait, editorial and fashion photography.
Ilse Argüero is a Mexican feminist artist who finds her work to be a mixture of personal diary and emotional mapping.
Imaan is currently on a gap year before pursuing her undergraduate degree in French and Arabic. Her work is driven by a desire to dismantle popular Orientalist narratives in media.
India Lawrence is a London-based freelance writer and marketer. She has a degree in Comparative Literature from King’s College London and is interested in the intersection between pop-culture, identity and art. India is a passionate advocate for women’s rights and also volunteers for period poverty charity, Irise International.
Ines is a multimedia creative with a background in production, photography, videography and graphic design. Initially training in her native France, she has since worked across film sets while developing her skills behind-the-scenes, creatively directing shoots for independent publications like shado and Humble. Inspired by the cinema of Cantonese auteur Wong Kar-Wai, Ines’ work is characterised by its bold, saturated hues, ambient lighting and love for its subjects.
Ipsita is a feminist illustrator based in New Delhi, India. Her art captures the multifarious human emotions and sentiments. They consist of vibrant illustrations and realist portraits. She has recently completed her Masters in Gender and Development from University of Sussex and have been freelancing for over a year. She uses her art to create key advocacy messages around gender equality as well as grow a community of solidarity.
Isaac Muk is a writer who loves underground arts and culture, intersectional identities – and anything underground really.
Isadora Machado is a Brazilian artist based in Porto, Portugal. Her works focus on drawing and painting as mediums, offering images as a device to explore about symbols and emotions. she is also dedicated to tarot readings and intuitive drawings experiments.
Jacinta Bunnell is the author of four coloring books with PM Press (The Big Gay Alphabet Coloring Book, Sometimes the Spoon Runs Away With Another Spoon, Girls Will Be Boys Will Be Girls Will Be... and Girls Are Not Chicks). PM Press is an independent, worker-run publisher of transformative, radical fiction, nonfiction, and multimedia which educates and inspires. She has been an educator for 20 years and has facilitated over 150 workshops at schools, youth shelters, punk houses, conferences and bookstores in the United States and Canada on independent publishing, zines, activism, and gender in the media.
Jack Howse is a writer living in Glasgow. He is editorial assistant at Greater Govanhill, a community magazine written by and for the people in Govanhill -- the most culturally diverse neighbourhood in Scotland. The magazine is collaborating with the Scottish investigative journalism platform The Ferret on a year-long investigation into health inequalities in Scotland with Jack looking to do a deep dive into the experiences of refugees and queer people in the health care system.
Jamil F. Khan (they/them) is a scholar, researcher, author and PhD candidate in Critical Diversity Studies at the Wits Centre for Diversity Studies. Their work uses creolisation as a framework for queering race, while exploring themes of belonging, stigma, social construction, and the making of abject societal figures. Their sociopolitical memoir ‘Khamr: The Makings of a Waterslams’ has been awarded the 2021 Humanities and Social Sciences Award for Best Biography, as well as the 2021 University of Johannesburg Debut Prize for South African Writing in English. They are a Research Fellow at the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study.
Jai is from Miami, Florida. They're a former wanderer and current skeptic learning how to write about the things they usually keep to themselves. If they're not at home cooking and bingeing Netflix with friends, they're out and about with a black book eavesdroppping on park patrons to draw inspiration from, or eating ice cream.
Janice Afandi is an artist born and raised in Indonesia. Driven by curiosity and wonder, she has always found interest in the creative field whether it's experiencing the works of other artists or creating her own. She finds joy in the storytelling of various art forms. Previously studying product design, she now does illustration in her spare time taking inspiration from history, culture to simply just observing the world around her.
Janka Swierzewska is a polish social and climate justice activist and a student of Ethnography and Cultural Anthropology in Warsaw. She has been very active over the past two years across a wide range of initiatives and protests. As thousands of battles are fought in Poland each year, Janka joins as many as possible, from blocking forest logging, to lignite mines, from cooking for unhoused people (Food not Bombs), to playing in Rhythms of Resistance Samba band. Where there is oppression, there is resistance!
Janna Tolcheva graduated from St. Petersburg Polytechnic University in 2017 with a Master's Degree in Computer Design. Janna currently works as a freelance illustrator based in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Janna's main fields of work are:
character illustration
illustrations for brands and projects editorial illustration
Illustrator
Javie Huxley is a British-Chilean illustrator based in London, and the co-chair for the Save Latin Village campaign. Following Javie's MA in Children's Literature & Illustration, her main focus has been on socially engaged editorial illustration for magazines such as Shado and gal-dem. Javie strongly believes in the importance of art as advocacy, her work focuses on themes such as identity and current social issues. Javie also uses her art to celebrate and platform Latinx voices in the UK. See her instagram for more work or get in touch via javierahuxley@gmail.com
Jay Price is a London based artist, with a Masters from the Royal College of Art, and Bachelors degree from University for the Creative Arts. They have exhibited in the UK, USA, South America, and Asia. Notable awards include Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust, Young Printmaker Award 2014, and the Adam Reynolds Award, among others.
Jeevan is a writer and editor based in Surrey BC, Canada. She loves writing about pop-culture, film, politics and community. When she isn’t writing, you can find her over-caffeinating, binging a new show or trying her hand at a new baking recipe.
Jemima Elliott is a Welsh journalist and climate justice activist based in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. After successfully campaigning against fast fashion giant Shein at her university, she is now University Community Organiser at Remake. She also organises as part of the Stop Rosebank campaign and has written for publications such as Sunday Times Ireland, Shado, The Tab UK and The Breakdown.
Jennifer is Co-Artistic Director of Lemon House Theatre, and has had plays staged at The King’s Head Theatre, Betsey Trotwood, The Courtyard, and the Rosemary Branch Theatre. She’s also been part of Soho Theatre’s Writers’ Lab and The S+K Project’s Artist Development Scheme.
Jess Mally (they/them) is a London-based anti-racism educator, consultant, writer, speaker, podcast host and creative producer. Jess’ work combines all of their skills for the purpose of social change. They hope to use any and all means available to them, to tell stories that shape a better world.
They are the co-founder of The AWETHU School of Organising alongside Mikaela Loach. AWETHU is a program dedicated to equipping young people from Black and Global Majority communities with the tools to take action in their communities and change the face of climate justice conversations in 10 years' time.
Beyond that, Jess works as a writer for various publications, consults and curates events for organisations aligned with their values, runs workshops, hosts The Third Way Podcast and is actively involved in the work of Black Liberation everywhere.
Jessica Clark is a London-based writer, poet and educator currently studying a PGCert in Teaching Creative Writing at the University of Cambridge. She has worked in education, hospitality and tourism in the UK, Spain and Peru and studied English and Spanish at Durham University. Her creative projects, often with a mental health focus, have included a poetry anthology in aid of Mind UK and radio show airing during the first 2020 lockdown. Jessica is developing poetry workshops to be delivered in community settings around London. She loves coffee, warm climates, baggy jumpers and meeting new people.
Jessica Kleczka is a climate psychologist, activist for a fossil-free future, and writer. Her research focuses on effective climate communication and how the climate crisis affects our mental health. She is involved with the Stop Rosebank campaign to stop the UK's biggest undeveloped oil field, and works with schools and universities to support young people in finding their place in the climate movement.
Jessie Williams is a freelance journalist, editor, and writer specialising in global current affairs, human rights, and social issues. Her work has been published in Foreign Policy, The Economist, The Independent, VICE, the Financial Times, Huck Magazine, Middle East Eye, Dazed, The Guardian, Novara Media, Refinery29, and others.
Jhannel is a scholar, activist and Sustainability Lead at Jamaican Women in Coffee.
Jitna is the founder of shewillsurvive.com, which advocates for gender equality and provides support resources for women impacted by gender-based violence worldwide. Current projects include creating a sustainable reusable sanitary pads programme in Kenya, mentoring parents on sexual health and gender equality to change harmful norms, and she's currently crowdfunding to start her own social enterprise to empower and employ marginalised women (in India and beyond). She’s happily married and is the lucky mama of two lovely daughters.
Joe Habben is a photographer and filmmaker based between Glasgow and Brighton. Joe’s practice focuses on social and environmental issues, exploring topics such as globalisation, public space, human intervention and the climate crisis.
Joe Nerssessian is a British-Armenian writer currently based in London. A former national news journalist, Joe now writes both fiction and creative non-fiction, exploring subjects including death, grief, inherited trauma, as well as Armenia and the Armenian Genocide – of which his grandfather was a survivor. Alongside his writing he also works for St Christopher’s Hospice in South London as a PR Manager.
John Jones is the Campaigns and Advocacy Manager at Free Tibet, an organisation that campaigns for an end to the Chinese occupation of Tibet and for international recognition of Tibetans' right to freedom.
Jonathan Nunn is a writer based in London who edits the food newsletter Vittles.
Jonathan Tserayi is a Zimbabwean freelancer currently residing in South Africa. With a creative writing background, he comes loaded with experience in editing, writing feature stories and creative pieces. His inspiration springs from humanitarian issues – justice, peace, social security, displacement, racism, inequality, etc. – which he seeks to articulate on various platforms.
Joseph Capehart is a poet and educator pushing the needle when they can and flipping the table when they must. Black, queer, and concerned with freedom, they teach 7th-grade students in Brooklyn and is the founder of The Garden, an abolitionist bookstore and community well in Brooklyn.
Joycelyn is environmental justice activist and academic. Her research centres on the design of justice-led conservation technologies for monitoring biodiversity with local forest communities in Ghana. She is also the founder of ClimateInColour, an online education platform and community for the climate curious. The platform is a launchpad for critical conversations but also a space of hope a space to make climate conversations more accessible and diverse and transform how people learn about, communicate and act on climate issues.
Julia Dagg is a freelance journalist and activist based in London. In her work she focuses on the impact of global capitalism on everyday life. By telling stories of ordinary people, she wants to make visible the systems of power permeating the everyday, whether that is in the context of the housing crisis, the climate emergency or the border industrial complex. She is a recent MA graduate in Postcolonial Studies from SOAS. In her dissertation she explored the bordering impacts of gentrification on the Black community in Peckham in South London. Originally from Germany, she has previously worked there as a journalist, too.
Juliana Vélez-Echeverri is a lawyer and researcher interested in exploring the impacts of the climate crisis on our relationship with place. From the right to remain to the right to move in the context of climate change, most of my work looks at how we give meaning to the places we inhabit and the way those become mobilisation frames. Juliana is co-founder of the Latin-American Centre of Environmental Studies (CELEAM) and has experience in community-driven litigation for social and climate justice in Colombia.
Julianne Gazzingan is a writer and musician from London, reading International Relations at KCL. Her research is particularly interested in the intersections of art, cultural identity and migration; influenced by her Filipino background and upbringing.
Juliette Lyons is a French-British freelance artist and journalist based in Kent whose work focuses mostly on women's rights and refugee rights. She currently works for her local domestic abuse charity, SATEDA, developing campaigns and communications to raise awareness of the gendered nature of domestic abuse.
Justin is a freelance writer based between Berlin and London. He’s assistant editor at INDIE mag, and was previously a junior reporter at Exberliner. He writes about culture and fashion in all forms, with particular interests in music and underground/youth subcultures.
K Bailey Obazee is the founder of PRIM, a platform for storytelling. PRIM created OKHA, the queer and black book club, holding monthly sessions along with exhibitions by artists of Black ancestry from the queer community. K is also an event host, DJ by the name of Drybabe and a member of the BBZ collective.
Kaja is a queer and disabled writer and intersectional activist living in South Wales. Kaja's work often explores themes of social justice, disability, LGBT+ life and environmentalism. She is the current Reviews Editor for Poetry Wales and a Network Weaver for Inclusive Journalism Cymru.
Kamana is an Indigenous Nepali writer based in the UK. She is a graduate from Queen Mary University of London and her interests lies on social and environmental justice. She actively supports the Gurkha Justice Campaign and focuses on activism writing to raise awareness about the campaign in her community and beyond.
Kareen Haddad is a Palestinian writer and organiser currently based in London, having grown up between Haifa, Jerusalem, and the UK. She currently is doing work with the Palestine Youth Movement, and has been a community organiser and advocate for the last few years.
Karen Castillo is a photojournalist based in Mexico. She co-directs Somos el Medio, an independent medium that covers issues related to human rights, migration, feminism, and Indigenous Rights. She's also an activist who believes autonomy, in all of its forms, is the only way of building new worlds based on justice and equality.
Karis Beaumont is a self-taught photographer, director, curator and documentarian from Hertfordshire. Her work focuses on the concept of beauty, as well as a few other themes. Her latest project Country Bumpkins is an ongoing body of work that centres around the Black British experience from a country perspective.
Karla Lizethe Hunter is a Guatemalan-British photographer based in London. She has previously been published in The Guardian, Time Out, The Independent, Mixmag and Huck for her documentary work across underground music cultures and separately for her involvement with the Save Latin Village Campaign in Tottenham.
Katherine Hearst is a writer, artist and filmmaker. She trained at the Royal College of Art and has since co-written and directed two animated films: Eddie and Frankie for which she was awarded funding from the Film and Television Charity and Arts Council England, and Outside the Box, for which she received funding from the BBC and BFIs Animation 2018 scheme and Arts Council England, and which was broadcast on BBC 4. Katherine’s journalistic writing has appeared in Open Democracy, Middle East Eye, The New Internationalist and Tribune Mag.
Katie is a freelance graphic designer and illustrator based in Manchester, specialising in branding, editorial and digital projects. She loves working with brands who are doing some good in the world.
Kato Ewekia is a Tuvaluan citizen who has found love for his country in the details that make it unique. The vitality and joy of his personality, as well as his lively hope for a better future, rubs off on everyone he meets along the way. In early 2020, he took over as national director of Saving Tuvalu: one of the most influential environmental organisations, at a local and national level. As well as being a passionate climate campaigner who would give his all for his country, he is an extraordinary musician whose guitar melodies resonate in the hearts of the entire community. He currently lives with his wife, Lavonne, and works tirelessly to ensure that the country's voices are heard.
Kavian is an Eela-Tamil physician focused on state violence as a determinant of poor health. From this starting point, he is interested in uses of the collective imagination, community-led and -owned models of care and place-making in journeying toward abolitionist, collectively liberated futures. He organises with Race & Health and the People's Health Movement.
Kay Rufai is a photographer, poet, filmmaker, author, mental health researcher and founder of the internationally acclaimed S.M.I.L.E-ing Boys projects. He explores the intersection between culture, masculinity, identity, racial emancipation, mental health and community cohesion through art, photography, educational workshops and public events. A great deal of his work has directly engaged diverse communities, minority, refugee and displaced groups of people as well as collaboratively creating bodies of work with them.
Keirit is a British-Punjabi writer and student born and raised in South London. Her writing focuses on the history, politics and future of the British South Asian diaspora. When not writing, her passions include speed-walking like a London commuter, half-heartedly supporting Crystal Palace, and listening to 80s synth pop.
Keyra Juliana Espinoza Arroyo is an Afro-Indigenous (Afro-Ecuadorian and Kañari) climate and racial justice advocate from Ecuador. Keyra has worked with various organisations as well as using her platform to story-tell and educate. Keyra hopes to form bridges between Afro and Indigenous communities as well as communities beyond borders due to the diverse backgrounds she comes from.
Khanya Kemami, aka WacomBoy / Khanya, is a South African born and raised illustrator, designer, digital artist, tattooist and trans activist whose works aim to embrace, represent and celebrate identities, experiences and realities that are left out of the art field or topics at the table. Other works also embrace and are inspired by the journey he faces throughout his spiritual awakening. With his works and how he moves through the world, he only hopes to include you, celebrate you, embrace you, be equal to you and depict you at your very best. The Black and Brown, Queer and Trans are his muse and true love.
Kohenoor Kamal is an illustrator and designer whose designs are made up of bright and bold colour palettes. Her research-driven designs are informed by her own experiences as Bangladeshi-British creative using her mediums to explore ideas which she feels have been underrepresented. She has also worked on projects to amplify and recognise the voices of those from BIPOC communities using what tools she has access to.
Komal Sultana Akbar is a journalist and creative from South London. Prior to moving back to London and pursuing freelance, she studied at the university of Stirling in Scotland.
Krishna Joshi is a MA Postcolonial Studies student at SOAS University of London and a volunteer at the Museum of British Colonialism since March 2020. They are currently writing up their dissertation and fussing over their cat. You can also follow the work of the Museum of British Colonialism, a joint UK/Kenyan initiative founded to creatively communicate a more truthful account of British colonialism, over at museumofbritishcolonialism.org.
Krzysia Balińska is a Polish performer, community organiser, and sometimes stand-up comedian. Her practice stems from the belief that everyone is an artist and everyone can act as an agent of lasting, positive change. In response to the near-total abortion ban proposed in the Polish parliament in 2016, Krzysia co-founded the Polish feminist collective Dziewuchy London which has become a platform for mobilising Polish activists.
Kushinga is from Zimbabwe and has lived in the UK for 23 years. She is a writer, refugee rights advocate and City of Sanctuary UK ambassador. She works for Refugee Support Group in Reading and the Sing for Freedom Choir.
Kushinga is passionate about human rights, social justice and issues affecting marginalised communities and people of colour.
Since her MA graduation in African and Islamic Studies at the University of Cologne with a focus on art and gender, Larissa works as a cultural manager and curator. After her great experience as an undergraduate student at Khartoum University, she decided to work in Sudan‘s arts scene for several years and founded the urban arts initiative ‘Yalla Khartoum’ with a collective of urban artists and co-founded the feminist band ‘Salute Yal Bannot’.
Laura studied International Relations and has a particular interest in critical feminism and the Middle East.
Laura Verónica Muñoz is an ecofeminist climate activist and audiovisual communicator from Colombia. She has been involved in the process of building the Colombian and Latin American climate message towards international conversations. She’s part of Fridays For Future, Pacto X El Clima, and Unite For Climate Action, and works in Grow Ahead supporting community-led agroforestry projects. She believes that to achieve climate justice it’s needed to create safe spaces where diversity is the foundation and decoloniality is the path we tread. Nowadays, she's studying Education, Gender and International Development MA.
Lauren is an artist who is proud of her mental illness, which has shaped her over the years, just like her art. All of her work is created around the themes of Mental Health & Body Image where she explores the constant cycle of recovery. She loves incorporating colour theory into her pieces and has so much fun creating colour palettes that soothe the soul. Her art is for her to survive and a reminder for all of the mental health warriors out there that they are not alone.
Lauren MacDonald is a Glaswegian total liberation activist. Her main work is with Stop Cambo, a campaign to stop the new Cambo oil field off the coast of Shetland, which has gained widespread public support in the last few months. She recently scathingly confronted the CEO of Shell in a TED talk which went viral and was seen by millions of people online. Her passions include social, climate, and animal justice, community power, foraging, and art.
Lauren is a freelance illustrator and animator based in London who also frequently runs art workshops in museums, galleries and schools up and down the country.
Latin American Women’s Rights Service is a user-led, feminist and human rights organisation focused on addressing the practical and strategic needs of Latin American migrant women displaced by poverty and violence. Latin Americans are one of the fastest growing ethnic minorities in the UK, but despite this they remain invisible. Their service users experience significant disadvantage as migrants, as women, and as members of an invisible minority ethnic group in this country.
Leah writes on state violence and abolition. Leah works at an advice centre for families subjected to the No Recourse to Public Funds hostile environment policy, who are facing homelessness/houselessness or destitution.
Leah Olasehinde is a final year student at King's College London, on the double degree English Law and French Law program. She is interested in human rights, particularly in migration, asylum and transitional justice, and hopes to pursue a career in policy and research.
Leeroy New is a Manila-based multidisciplinary artist whose practice overlaps and intersects with different creative industries: fashion, filmmaking, theatre, public installations, product design, and performance. This practice of moving across different modes of creative production has become the backbone of his work, driven by concepts of world building, hybrid myth-making, and social change.
Leila Gamaz is an Algerian-English writer exploring untold stories, ritual, and sisterhood. She uses interviews and archival research to reveal other perspectives on Algerian and English lived experiences and the intersections between them. She is interested in inherited knowledge and trauma, and the ways in which this frames our lives. Leila co-founded Houria, a pan-African catering business that employs migrant women and survivors of modern slavery.
Lena is a Palestinian-American ceramicist, design enthusiast, thinker, artist and coffee-drinker. She grew up between the deserts of New Mexico and Amman, Jordan, and completed her MSc in cultural and social anthropology at the University of Amsterdam. In 2017, along with Nahla Tabba’a and Sarah Hatahet, she co-founded Daftar Asfar, a collaborative sketchbook project based in the Middle East.
Leonardo is a Quechua-heritage Peruvian migrant, activist, and researcher focused on political resistance, environmental justice, and housing rights. With a background in political science and urban regeneration, his work explores the intersections of extractivism, state violence, and grassroots movements in Latin America. A long-time organiser in Peru’s social movements, he has been actively involved in protests against authoritarianism and youth work exploitation. His writing, informed by lived experience and academic research, aims to amplify marginalised voices and challenge dominant narratives.
Leonida Odongo is a Kenyan social justice activist with vast experience in grassroots organising, advocacy, and adult learning methodologies. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science and Sociology from the University of Nairobi and is currently undertaking a Masters in International Conflict Management. Leonida has a passion for working with grassroots communities and focuses on food justice, climate justice, rural women and youth. Leonida nurtures university students on human rights and social justice in Universities in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania.
Leonida is a featured changemaker, vocal contributor, and ambassador at World Pulse. She is also a member of the civil society and Indigenous peoples mechanism for relations with the Committee on World Food Security (CFS). Leonida is a board member at Food Coop Kenya and A Growing Culture.
Liam Woods is a trans + non binary image maker based out of Los Angeles. Their work is characterised by the vulnerable, candidly intimate storytelling of queer people, people of colour and other marginalised communities.
With their brand experience, Liam has formed over 50 creative job opportunities (and counting) for BIPOC and queer people both in front of and behind the camera. The main mission in their work is to continue to build upon community and provide resources/access for the betterment of BIPOC and queer creatives as a whole.
Lidia Huerta Domingo is a Catalan-Peruvian filmmaker and writer based between London and Madrid. With a background in Film and an MA in Applied Imagination from Central Saint Martins, she explores the complexities of everyday life through themes of love, home, and grief. Her diary-like, essay-driven style invites audiences to reflect on the quiet moments we all share while creating spaces for vulnerability and relatability.
Lillie Aissa-Jeanrenaud is an ecological storyteller and biocultural creative who attempts to reunite nature and culture. She has Amazigh roots, a community whose lifeways are nearing extinction in Tunisia. This gives Lillie a passion for preserving, storytelling and finding new ways to engage people with place. Lillie conducted independent research on biocultural diversity in New York City’s community gardens, specialising in migrant plant histories and their coevolution with diasporic communities in urban ecosystems. She also founded Love Letters To Landscapes and MENA for Environment: initiatives to increase diversity within environmentalism and showcase nature-culture linkages. She is a climate speaker and storyteller with the Environmental Funders Network.
Lily is a feminist writer and cartoonist.
Born and raised in Saint Martin, Lisandro Suriel earned his Bachelor’s degree in Photography at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague and received his Masters of Art by research in Artistic Research at the University of Amsterdam. Lisandro's work has been published worldwide and featured in numerous exhibitions.
Illustrator
Lois Barton is a co-founder of Lilith Archive, and currently undertaking a research masters on Global Environmental challenges at the University of Bristol, working with the Cabot Institute for the Environment on artistic activism in socio-environmental movements.
Loraine Mponela is a mother, writer, community organiser and migrants’ rights campaigner. She is originally from Malawi and moved to the UK in 2008 where she now lives in Coventry. Loraine is the ex-chair for Coventry Asylum and Refugee Action Group (CARAG) and is the co-chair for the Status Now 4 All Campaign which is calling for Indefinite Leave to Remain for all that need it in the UK and Ireland. Loraine also sits on the advisory group of Refugee Week UK.
Lotte is a sex worker and author of the memoir “Dear Mr Andrews.” She organises with Hookers Against Hardship, a grassroots campaign of sex worker-led organisations, aiming to raise awareness of the specific experiences of sex workers during, and because of, the cost-of-living crisis.
Lourdes Vera is a Latina PhD Candidate in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology and Social Science Environmental Health Research Insititute at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts. Lourdes holds an MA in Teaching Earth Science from CUNY Brooklyn College, and her BA is in Urban Studies from Barnard College at Columbia University. As a former high school science teacher, she is interested in fusing critical pedagogy with community-based science to push for anti-racist environmental policies and regulatory oversight. Lourdes is also on the coordinating committee of the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative, which she helped form to archive, assess, and envision new infrastructures for federal and state environmental data.
Luci Pina is an image maker and illustrator based in Leeds, UK. With a dreamy and sentimental approach to image making, her practice tends to follow personal narratives in response to text and poetry – usually a visual exploration of image, type and drawing. Along personal narratives, she enjoys making research-led responses to Black culture; with energy, intention and a conscious and loving consideration for the politics of representation.
Luís Henrique Marques Ribeiro is a journalist and a doctoral researcher at the Graduate Program in Film at the Fluminense Federal University. His research focuses on the study of racial representations in contemporary Brazilian cinema based on decoloniality, territory and class. He also works as a copywriter, having produced SEO texts for architecture, health, travel and education company blogs.
Luisa De la Concha Montes is a visual artist, photographer and writer born and raised in Mexico City. She moved to the United Kingdom in 2017 and now resides in London. She holds an MA from the University of Sussex in Photography. Her work attempts to bring shapeless states, such as grief, diaspora, identity and memory into a physical form through documentary photography, digital explorations and visual poetry.
Luke is a copywriter living and working in London. After starting a career in advertising in 2019, he discovered a passion for writing in both short and long form, creatively and as a cathartic practice. Influenced by his Caribbean heritage, his work focuses mainly on race relations and social justice both in the UK and across the pond.
Luna Schvartzman is a young student and researcher from the suburbs of Buenos Aires, Argentina. She studies sociology at University of Buenos Aires and campaigns for Women and LGBTQ+ Movement rights. Her focus is currently on Latin America's institutional politics, as well as lesbian and sapphic history.
Maddy Crowther is a Sudan policy watcher and country expert, and Co-Executive Director at Waging Peace, an NGO that supports Sudanese asylum-seekers, refugees, and the wider diaspora in the UK to build meaningful lives.
Currently studying an MA in Journalism, Media and Globalisation in Charles University, Prague, Maedbh Pierce is an English and Philosophy graduate from UCD, Dublin and freelance writer. To date, her writing explores and celebrates queer identity, life and culture. Amongst others, her work has been featured in Material Queer, COVEN BERLIN, Unicorn Magazine, Nonchalant London, and The Single Supplement.
Magz is an Irish community rights organiser, between Belfast and Beirut, dedicated to housing & migrant rights.
Maia Golzar Anderson is an Iranian-American Jewish graduating senior at Columbia University and the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York City. Her work focuses on neocolonialism and natural resource extractivism through migration and cultural identity in the Middle East and North Africa. Through immersive fieldwork and language study, Maia strives to understand global power systems through grassroots decolonial organisation, emphasising systemic change to land, labour, and natural resource rights.
Maisie Goulsbra is a writer whose journalism centres around social issues via the lens of music and the arts. She was longlisted for Penguin’s WriteNow 2020 scheme and her words appear in Dummy, where she is a staff writer, Notion, Green Queen, Smiths and Revolt.
Makan are a Palestinian-led transformative education organisation that strengthens voices for Palestinian rights.
They help to transform the existing narrative on Palestine-Israel to one that upholds freedom, justice and equality for all by delivering educational workshops and trainings on Palestine, creating useful resources and tools for human rights advocates, and connecting people and organisations active on the issue to one another.
Makan help strengthen the Palestine movement in the UK and, by extension, the global movement that is pushing for freedom for Palestinians.
www.makan.org.uk
Malvika is an award-winning India-born, London-based freelance journalist, editor and content creator, covering music, climate change, food, film, culture, mental health, and most other things in-between.
Manasa Narayanan is a journalist who covers politics and technology. She works for the news non-profit the Citizens, and is a researcher and contributor with the Real Facebook Oversight Board. With a postgraduate degree in Political Communication, she continues to research and write about topics at the intersection of politics and technology; more interested in the politics of people and technology than politics of the state. Occasionally she writes essays, and dabbles in poetry.
Manna Mostaghim is a researcher who examines the socio-political conditions that culminate in the provision of healthcare for disenfranchised minorities in the global North. Her work especially examines the role of race and gender in the provision of healthcare and health infrastructure. She has presented her original research at Oxford University and the London School of Economics.
Marcela Onyango is a stand-up comedian and writer based in Brooklyn. She was born in Kenya and raised in Texas. She currently hosts Feel the News, a short humorous news show on TikTok. She’s been featured in the Black Women in Comedy Festival and The Laughing Devil Cup Festival. Her humor writing has been published on Slackjaw.
Marcie Mintrose is a designer and illustrator based in London. Her work is focused on facilitating community engagement and supporting marginalised narratives.
Maria Azul Schvartzman studied Environmental Sciences at Buenos Aires University and currently she specialises in climate change and youth engagement issues. In 2019 she was selected as a Youth Delegate to the G20 and to COY15 and COP25. In 2020, she tried to cross the Atlantic in a sailboat with other young climate activists from her region but had to return halfway through because of COVID-19. She was later part of the organising team of the Building Bridges for Climate Action project, which aimed to amplify the voices of youth climate activists in the LAC region.
Maria is the founder and editor-in-chief at Slideluck Editorial, an international platform for Photography & Multimedia.
Marianne is a Filipina illustrator and designer based in London, recently graduated from UCA. Her work is mostly inspired by her experience within the Asian diaspora, along with her love of film, fashion and music, and the social commentary that comes with them.
Mariochukwu Washington-Ihieme is a photographer and researcher based in London and a regular contributor to shado. Her interests involve a culmination of examining her London upbringing and its intersections with her Nigerian culture, and her relations with the diaspora across the globe. She also examines the changing dynamics of cities and the effects of public policies on communities' culture and placemaking. An avid traveller with a particular interest in West Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Mario centres the community narrative and enjoys cultivating relationships and amplifying the work of other artists and changemakers involved in preserving and passing down stories for future generations.
Martha Roussou is the Senior Advocacy Officer for the International Rescue Committee in Greece. Based in Athens, she has been advocating for the rights of refugees and asylum seekers living in Greece since 2016. Before then, Martha worked for various NGOs and the European Parliament, advocating for European asylum policies and women's rights.
Mary Anne Hitt is an advocate and strategist. She is the National Director of Campaigns at the Sierra Club, where she previously served for a decade as director of the Beyond Coal Campaign, recognized as one of the most successful environmental campaigns in history. Working with partners across the nation, the campaign blocked the construction of 200 proposed US coal plants, secured retirement of over half of existing US coal plants, and helped usher in the clean energy era. She also co-hosts the climate storytelling podcast No Place Like Home.
Mary Tolstova is an illustrator from Moscow, works on a variety of social topics such as domestic violence, torture in prisons, LGBT rights, freedom of speech, human rights violations, migrants, environmental issues and many other things. She has worked as an illustrator for different Russian media, and has been working as an illustrator in Mediazona since 2015.
Masa Nazzal is a researcher, artist, and activist based in Glasgow, whose work is based around border violence along the EU’s Balkan borders against people in transit. She has spent time in Bosnia and Croatia with the group No Name Kitchen, researching and recording testimonies of personal accounts of violence committed by the EU for a sonic ethnography project. Masa uses creative mediums, such as writing, sound, and embroidery to explore the affective ways state violence and borders rupture and redefine how people inhabit the world. Her work focuses on the transformative power of listening as a bridge towards solidarity, action, and change.
Masha Kaasha is an illustration artist and graphic designer based in Wrocław, Poland.
Matthew Barton is an award-winning independent filmmaker whose work deals with themes of humanity, adversity and marginal stereotypes. He is currently involved in projects with charities, think tanks and philanthropy groups around the issue of youth homelessness, food-waste and special educational needs.
Matteo Portigliatti is a freelance photographer who focuses his work on conflicts, disputed borders and migrations mainly in Asia and the Middle East region. He graduated from the IED in Turin and from Memo Masterclass.
Matthew Blaise is a non-binary LGBTQI+ activist from Nigeria and one of the foresoldiers of the #EndHomophobiaInNigeria campaign which trended on social media space. They're passionate about personal liberation hence they use social media networks as a means of reaching out to young queer people and helping them accept their queer identity in a very homophobic country like Nigeria.
Mauricio Holc is a photographer and filmmaker from Oberá (a small city near the border of Brazil and Paraguay). Through his artistic vision and personal experience, he tells the story of people who have been systematically silenced and unseen by society simply because they are "different", emphasising non-hegemonic bodies and skin, the LGBTQ+ community, people with disabilities, and feminists, celebrating the diversity in his community and promoting inclusion and equality.
Max Offerman is an environmental activist and the Social Media Director of Force of Nature. He was born in St. Petersburg, Russia before being adopted and raised in Kalamazoo, Michigan, where the US's largest inland oil spill took place. He spent the last four years working with local environmental groups on issues in Michigan before joining Force of Nature and has a keen focus on psychology and eco-anxiety, the intersection between Eastern and Western schools of thought, and helping others understand themselves. He also enjoys skateboarding and designing modular clothing.
Megan Warrender is a freelance music writer currently based in Toulouse, France. She is also part of a collective that runs life drawing classes championing inclusivity and intersectionality whilst exploring body positivity. Embracing our differences, celebrating them, and not taking ourselves too seriously are at the heart of these workshops.
Mehdi is currently a Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Glasgow, focusing on the international politics of the Middle East. He has also previously taught at SOAS University of London and King's College London (KCL) in the fields of Middle East politics, International Development, History and International Theory.
Mei Yuk Wong was born in Hong Kong. Her first degree was at the South East Asia Graduates School of Theology in Hong Kong. She then studied Women and Development at Institute of Social Studies in The Hague. She is a visual artist, textile designer and poet, and a founding member of the "Centre for International Women Artists" in Manchester – a collective studio, gallery and events space supporting the continuing professional development of international women artists.
Michael Lomotey is a Doctoral Researcher who uses the Black Radical Tradition as theoretical, methodological and ontological frames through which to seek to uncover truths in climate change discourses.
Michaela Makusha is a writer and journalist. Her work focuses on the intersections of politics and culture and she is passionate about passionate about politics, racial and gender issues on and offline.
Michele Theil is a freelance journalist based in London who specialises in coverage of the LGBTQI+ community, race, culture and social issues.
Michelle focuses on identity, politics and current affairs. Her work is both about commentating on aspects of society that she's critical of, as well as being positive and empowering.
Milli-Rose is currently a student at Goldsmiths University and works part time at the RoundHouse, a creative hub providing music opportunities for young people. Through unstable chapters in her life writing became an daily ritual, and her work has since been published in different outlets.
West-Midlands born, London-raised of South Asian heritage, broadcaster, actor and writer Mim Shaikh is best known for his supporting role in the BBC One crime drama series Informer. Outside of his acting roles, Mim has built a significant reputation as a broadcaster. In 2018, he also released his debut documentary Finding Dad which followed Mim on his search for his biological father in Pakistan. Mim also runs a popular YouTube channel where he performs his spoken word poetry.
Miriam Abdulla is Artist Liaison for Legacy of War Foundation, an organisation which aims to empower communities and individuals in rebuilding their own lives after conflict.
Working with sound as both a medium and a subject, artist Miriam Bean primarily creates indeterminate installations and experiments with ways of translating audio into images. Her research into sound perception ranges from physiology to musicology, seeking to understand how the brain interprets some sounds as noise and others as expressive, concordant music. Through spatial intervention, her work highlights the unearthly nature of pure tones, and the acoustic qualities they possess.
Mitzi Jonelle Tan is a climate justice activist based in Metro Manila, Philippines. She is the convenor and international spokesperson of Youth Advocates for Climate Action Philippines (YACAP) which is like the Fridays For Future of the Philippines. She is also active in Fridays for Future International, advocating for climate justice and making sure that voices of Most Affected Peoples and Areas (MAPA)’s strikers are heard, amplified, and given space. She first became an activist in 2017 after integrating with Indigenous leaders of her country which pushed her to realise that system change is what we need for a just and greener society.
Molly Ann Pendlebury is a British illustrator, sound and moving image maker based in London. Her work draws from daily observations of people and characters, topical issues relating to societal norms and expectations, politics and sexuality. Not circumscribing to a particular medium, she enjoys exploring outcomes in a variety of forms; from print and collage to video and sound.
Molly Hankinson is a visual artist, illustrator and muralist from South East London, now living and working in Glasgow. She graduated in Fine Art: Painting and Printmaking from The Glasgow School of Art in 2018, and was then awarded the graduate studio residency at SWG3 Studio Warehouse, where she now has her permanent studio. Molly looks at the honest and unapologetic representation of people who experience misogyny, with an unparalleled and celebratory reclamation and ownership of space evident in her work. Incorporating the aesthetics of bright and considered colour placement with use of continuous line, Molly creates ‘bold and subtly detailed, inclusive celebrations of feminine vitality’.
Molly is a long-distance cyclist, community organiser and writer driven by a belief in collective care, global solidarity and joyful resistance. From 2017 to 2020, Molly cycled over 20,500 km from the UK to New Zealand through 22 countries – a journey that raised funds and awareness for Choose Love and profoundly reshaped her understanding of herself and the world. Molly's commitment to humanitarian and environmental justice was solidified along the way. Since then, Molly has led grassroots programmes focused on inclusive access to nature, mental health and the power of ordinary people to drive change – always with a lens on who gets left out and how we can create something better. Molly is currently working on her first book about adventure, identity and the healing found in physically empowering ourselves.
Molly Lipson is a freelance writer, editor and filmmaker based in London and Spain.
Monica Lozano is a Mexican-American photographer born in El Paso, Texas and raised across the border in the sister city of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Lozano received her MA in Photography in Madrid, Spain in Escuela Universitaria TAI. She came back to the border where she began life, straddling two countries and teaching University students about photography and how art can transcend borders.
Munirah is a visual designer with focus on exploring visuals from her cultural roots in a Malay-archipelago perspective. Her passion is on rethinking myths and decolonising narratives.
Muntjac is a group of Asian & Black working class and lumpen anarchists in diaspora across the “UK” who came together after defending themselves during the fascist pogroms in the summer of 2024. They recognised the shortcomings of the anarchist & Global Majority abolitionist mediascape(s) and decided to make a publication, publishing house, print shop, blog and network by and for people like them.
Myla is a graphic designer based in Meanjin (Brisbane). She is passionate about visual communications role in supporting service, education and advocacy. She is driven by conceptual design that builds an emotional connection with an idea, purpose or goal. Working with a broad range of clients from government initiatives to not-for-profit organisations, Myla takes a collaborative approach to my work ensuring that it reflects the projects genuine values and intentions.
Nadia Whittome is the Labour MP for Nottingham East. She was first elected in 2019 at the age of 23, making her the UK’s youngest member of parliament. Previously, she was a care worker and a hate crime worker. She has been outspoken on issues including poverty and inequality, the climate emergency, migrants’ rights and LGBTQ+ rights. She is a Vice-Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on the Green New Deal and co-sponsored the Green New Deal Bill.
Naziha is a Libyan-British film director, producer, writer and artist. Her films have been shown at international film festivals, and her documentary film Freedom Fields was nominated for a BAFTA award.
Namitha Aravind is a freelance journalist and former Editor-in-Chief at YouthPolitics UK. Her work has been featured in a range of publications including The Times, The Independent, Metro UK, Stylist Magazine, and Manchester Evening News. She is also currently a student at the London School for Economics & Politics Science.
Nancy Hurman is a London based documentary photographer and picture researcher. As well as co-founder of visual research collective RAKE. Her work focuses on social and humanitarian issues both locally and globally, particularly exploring subjects that are uncertain or unseen, her most recent work centres around the immigration detention system in the UK and the bureaucratic violence that sustains it.
Naomi Gennery is a Bristol-based graphic designer, illustrator and maker. Inspired by a mishmash of influences Naomi likes to take on serious subjects with a playful, humorous touch using type, bold colours and shapes throughout her work. With an interest in collage, zines, diy culture, satire, print making and crafts, Naomi uses mixed media to create her illustrative work and works in range of mediums and materials.
Natasha is a designer and writer from Bali, Indonesia. As communications editor for What Design Can Do, she spends most of her time researching and developing stories about the changing role of design in social and climate justice. This includes content production for the What Design Can Do blog, print publications like Never Waste a Good Crisis (2021) and media campaigns for various events and challenges. When she's not writing, she's usually working to bring other people's stories to life, working as an independent editor, graphic designer and publisher.
Natasha is based in Glasgow and campaigns on climate and migrant justice issues. They currently work as Climate Campaigner at BankTrack.
Natasha is a UK-based freelance illustrator who loves using bold colours and incorporating words or a sense of movement into her work. She has always enjoyed sketching and drawing but her love for digital illustration began whilst leading the design team for Impact, her University’s student-run magazine. As she has become more experienced in article-based illustrations she has experimented with different types of imagery, endeavouring to portray the deeper meaning behind an author’s message. She loves editorial illustration because it gives art a purpose - helping to enhance the words of a writer.
Natasha Shah is a performer and photographer from London.
Nathalie Weatherald is a journalist and News Editor for EURACTIV. Her freelance work focuses on the intersection between politics and culture. She is currently based between London and Prague.
Neha is a multidisciplinary artist, illustrator & visual storyteller who specializes in crafting & illustrating stories taking but not restricted to their experience as a South Asian femme creative, representing local culture & people, amongst other things that influence the design industry at large.
Neha Vaddadi is an illustrator and graphic designer based in Hyderabad, India. Although trained as an architect, she works independently out of her home studio doing illustrations and graphic design in collaboration with social scientists, activists, NGOs, educators, filmmakers, podcasters and many other cool movers & shakers, apart from also drawing for herself. Her favourite themes to explore include urban life and the people that make cities what they are, nature, the cosmos and our place in it. She loves doing immersive sketch series which span weeks or months at a time. She also loves immersive travel, preferably steeped in nature, and the longer the better!
A Thai native, Net started off her career working in Singapore in the big old boys’ club: advertising. Don’t get her wrong, she loved her job. She just didn’t love marketing things that didn’t mean anything to her. After founding the CSR initiative for her company, she quickly realised there was a soft spot where passion can actually meet profession. So she decided to switch gears. Fast. She is now based in London and currently pursuing a MSc in Social Innovation & Entrepreneurship at LSE while getting ila off the ground.
Ngadi Smart is a Sierra Leonean visual artist based in Côte d'Ivoire. She works in the mediums of photography and illustration. The themes in her illustrative work fluctuate between female and male power dynamics, to feminism, to female sexuality and are often also fashion and pop culture inspired. Her photography work has long been focused on how people self-identify and choose to present themselves in front of the lens. As of late, her interest has been documenting Black sensuality from an African lens and point of view. Her aim is to show as many representations of African people, and the complexities of what it means to be African, as she can.
Nicola Parfitt is a wannabe creative, currently studying a MA in Environmental Studies and Sustainability Science at Lund University, Sweden. She is also a passionate intersectional environmentalist and uses art to convey both social and climate justice issues, via Instagram. Other than that, she is a volunteer in an Amnesty student group and a few nights a month she spends her evenings working for a Swedish mental health organisation. Some of her most impressionable years were those spent growing up in Tanzania, which she strongly believes ignited many of the passions she’s devoted to today
Nicole Becker is an Argentinian climate activist and the co-founder and one of the main organisers of Jovenes Por El Clima. For her efforts in fighting against climate change, the Argentine Congress has recognized Nicole as one of the most outstanding young women in the country. She advocates for a climate policy that complies with the Paris Agreement at the international level and speaks about the relationship between social justice and climate justice.
Nicole is a sex-positive writer and content creator whose favourite topics to speak about are kink, polyamory, queerness and safer sex.
Nicole Jashapara is a writer and reviewer based in London. You can find her work on nature writing, literature and all things climate justice-related in Bad Form, Oxford Poetry, the Tilt and the Oxford Review of Books.
Nikita Sena is a writer and researcher based in London, by way of Ghana. She has a background in human rights and is interested in the role of art and creative practices in revealing both the nature of oppression and routes to liberation. As a curatorial resident at be’kech, a former community workspace in Berlin, she facilitated workshops that used collage and painting to explore socio-political issues. She has also worked with one of her favourite people to curate an online event with Autograph ABP London, on artivism and transnational solidarity. Nikita’s dream is to create spaces that reject the tyranny of oppression, alienation, and inertia so that we can instead be submerged in pleasure, experimentation and the possibility of poetic revolution.
Nikki is a writer with a background is in politics, human rights and governance and has experience working in non-profits. Her writing explores taboo, culture, relationships and she is enthused about telling stories that make you want to research topics, and learn more about the world.
Nikta Sabouri is a student in the MSc program in Global Governance and Ethics at University College London. With an interdisciplinary background in Law and Economics, she is passionate about digital rights, the accessibility of knowledge and engaging in collaborative spaces for change.
Nina Held is a Research and Teaching Fellow in the Department of Sociology at the University of Sussex. As a postdoctoral researcher she is working on the ERC-funded project SOGICA – Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Claims of Asylum. Before coming to Sussex, Nina worked in different voluntary organisations. She worked as the Development Worker at Trafford Rape Crisis for two years and as the Centre Co-ordinator at Freedom from Torture North West for five years. For seven years, she was the chair and a volunteer for the Lesbian Immigration Support Group in Manchester.
Ning works for progressive causes and campaigns, and is based in New York City.
Nivetha is a poet, chef, DJ and radio host.
The No Evictions Network is a grassroots campaign run by people with experience of the asylum system and their allies in Glasgow. The network organises to support people in asylum accommodation in Glasgow.
Nonhlanhla Makuyana is a Community Economist and one half of Decolonising Economics. Their work seeks to facilitate sensuous understandings of the economy that nourish life by focusing on African diaspora economic thought and practice. Through research, archiving, facilitation and writing, their work builds a bridge between historic and contemporary movements for economic self determination.
Nyancho NwaNri is a Gamgerian (Gambian-Nigerian) filmmaker and photographer whose work revolves around African culture, history, languages, spirituality, ethnic/cultural identity as well as social and environmental issues. Her works have been exhibited at various film and photography festivals locally and internationally and she has also taken part in several group exhibitions in Nigeria. Nyancho is also an accredited Canon film and photography trainer and conducts trainings and workshops across Africa.
She is dedicated to the research and preservation of African cultures, traditions and history, bridging the ancient and contemporary through her work as she believes the future cannot exist without the past.
Abideen Olasupo is a tri-sector business leader and technology consultant dedicated to driving impact at the intersection of Development, Innovation, and Strategy.
Olga is working on a PhD at the University of St Andrews, studying graduate recruitment and the labour market, with a focus on how the mundane and material infrastructures of recruitment contribute to our understanding of what it means to be a graduate. Her scholarship spans and tries to make mutually intelligible often disparate literatures: feminism and science and technology studies, sociology and philosophy. Outside of academia, she similarly tries to use illustrations and design to reach across communities, and believes that art is a powerful means of communication, connection, inclusion, and activism.
Oli Lipski is The Queer Sensualist, a freelance sex & sex tech writer, bisexual researcher, public speaker, and future sensuality coach. With degrees specialising in the History of Bisexuality and Queer Theory, she is passionate about queering the conversation around sex, pleasure, and relationships. Since graduating she has spent her career working with various sex-positive companies, from vibrator brands, sensual tech businesses, to adult sex ed and edu-porn platforms, and is now also on the path of coaching people into finding their most sensual selves.
Olive is a freelance writer and the Protection Officer at SOS-Humanity.
Olivia McEwan-Hill is a UK based illustrator, now living and working in Leeds. Her work describes an ethereal connection to the natural world, highlighting interactions and interconnections between people and place. Using symbols and imagery from everyday experiences, she intertwines nostalgic colours and patterns to shape a story through image. Her creative practice is founded in sustainability, recycling materials and exploring illustration through this.
Oluwaseun Babalola is DOC NYC 40 under 40 Honoree, award-winning director, Emmy-nominated producer, exhibited photographer, and nonprofit executive director. Her passion for storytelling led her to found Kosinima, Inc., a nonprofit that provides career support for Black creatives including two short film grant funds and ṢOJU, a digital documentary series celebrating youth culture on the African continent.
Oluwaseun Famoofo is a passionate narrator. A lover of comedy shows and wine, you will mostly see her glued to her laptop revealing one story or the other. Creating her novels and building their characters gives her the utmost satisfaction.
Omar Elmawi is a highly motivated lawyer with over seven years of experience assisting communities to assert their rights and have their voices heard in development projects coming to their doorsteps. His previous work has included successfully resisting coal in Kenya and coordinating a campaign against the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline.
Ophelia Dos Santos is a Welsh textile designer and educator; advocating for climate justice and sustainability within fashion. Through her work, Ophelia translates complicated climate science into enjoyable creative content – aiming to reach Black and marginalised communities that are typically less engaged with environmentalism in Wales. Ophelia champions action that is led by optimism for the future, not by fear.
A manifestation of her resistance to the current status quo, Padmini’s practice attempts to unravel the seams that tightly hold capitalism, power, and different systems of oppression together. As a means to explore this oppressive nexus and cope with the resulting socio-economic and ecological crises being experienced today, she often leans toward the written form, research, community organising and sculpture. She also likes to spend time with her two cats and dog.
Paola De La Cruz spent her most impressionable years in the Dominican Republic alongside the warm sun and singing wind. Upon moving to Boston at the age of nine, she was inspired by the activist movements happening around her. Think of the Romanticism art movement featuring Black and Brown folks; picture ethereal Black and Brown femmes bathing in the warmth of nature and her motherly embrace. Paola interweaves digital and analog media, patterns, stitching and shape-based illustrations to evoke intimacy while challenging the themes of cultural identity, coming of age, and metamorphosis.
Pasqueline is an aspiring journalist and content creator, part of Young Historians Project, an research collective led by young people of African and Caribbean heritage, with a focus of Black British History. She also runs her own Instagram page and YouTube channel. In the future, she would like to create documentaries based on social justice issues.
Petar Odak is a PhD researcher in gender studies and a freelance journalist currently based in Berlin. His areas of interest include: museums and performances, affect and post-socialist studies.
Phoebe is a London based writer and researcher specialising in contemporary social issues, and interesting people. Her award winning research focused on the ‘refugee voice’ – how the experiences and testimonies of refugees and people seeking asylum are treated within the UK’s hostile environment and bureaucratic processes. She believes deeply in centralising the perspectives and experiences of forced migrants within the field of contemporary humanitarian responses to displacement. In addition to her written work, Phoebe volunteers with organisations working to build the power, dignity and justice of refugee communities in London.
Pilo Moreno is a musician, chef and human rights activist. He is part of Freed Voices, a group of individuals with lived experience in UK immigration detention who speak out about the realities of detention and advocate for reform.
Polina Bachlakova is a Canadian journalist and editor based in Copenhagen, with bylines in the BBC, openDemocracy, VICE Identity, FRAME and more. She's also editor-in-chief of BEDTIME Magazine, an ethical porn publication by Bedside Productions, and the co-founder of a feminist horror film club called Bloody Mary Presents. Previously, Polina was a board member and activist at The Red Van, an NGO providing harm reduction for street-based sex workers.
Qianrui Hu is a PhD student at School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London. His academic interests mainly include sociology of border, war, migration, ethnicity. Having started his PhD in 2021 before Russia’s full-scale invasion against Ukraine, he initially planned his fieldtrip to Donbas to write about the everyday social dynamics happening in the background of the war there. Since the outbreak of the big war, he focuses on people’s reinterpretations of their war experience between 2014 and 2022 in Donbas in relation to the full-scale war. Besides his academic work, he has also volunteered for organisations aiming at refugee relief, such as KHARPP and Ukrainian House in Warsaw.
Queers for Palestine is a campaigning and direct action group, committed to the struggle for a just world, free of settler-colonialism, Zionism, and capitalism. They believe that such a world can only be maintained by a shared commitment to joint struggle, anti-colonial and anti-imperalist queer values. They aim to create a non-hierarchical space that is open and friendly to all queers to come together, engage in political education, and take action towards liberation.
Rachel Erskine manages communications at Amref Health Africa’s UK office. She has been working in the international NGO sector for almost a decade. Her work has taken her to Afghanistan, Jordan, Myanmar, Nepal, and Sudan, where she’s had the privilege of meeting many young women like Ayachuol, Mulu, Nigist and Nyabuay.
Rachel is an Iñupiaq/Norwegian/Sami social justice filmmaker and educator from Utqiagvik (Barrow), Alaska. She is a Producer and Impact Producer on the film In My Blood It Runs directed in collaboration by Maya Newell and produced with Sophie Hyde and Larissa Bahrendt. Alongside filmmaking, Rachel has been honoured to work in education reform with communities across Alaska and Australia. She works closely with her husband and Human Rights lawyer/filmmaker and educator, David S Vadiveloo, across Australia and Alaska. Together Rachel and David have three beautiful children.
Rachel O’Sullivan is an Irish lover of all things creative, whimsical and wonderful. They insist they spend their time writing and reading anything and everything, taking photographs and drawing. Instead, they actually spend most of their days rummaging through charity shops and working up the courage to respond to emails. Their work embodies the liminal, the uncanny and the uncomfortable - as well as divulging into all that is golden and glimmers. You can find traces of them on all corners of the internet, if you look hard enough.
Rachelle Adad Mesley is a teacher, stay at home mum and activist. She is passionate about social justice, with a particular focus on anti-racism and climate justice. Rachelle is a member of Parents for Future, a grassroots climate action group, and co-coordinates a local chapter of the group. Recently, she became a board member for EVR ESEA (End Violence and Racism against East and Southeast Asian Communities). Locally, Rachelle works to raise awareness through schools and her local community on the importance of diversity and inclusion, and the need for decolonisation in order to create a better world for our children and future generations.
Rahel was born in Addis Ababa, raised in South London and is currently finding inspiration in Barcelona. She is interested in creating poetry that is visually stimulating and investigates ways to combine poetry with art. She also writes longer social commentary pieces and advice articles. Her favourite thing about writing is hearing the different interpretations that readers take from her often abstract imagery. She is working towards self-publishing a co-illustrated book.
Rahul is an Eelam Tamil young professional who moved to Canada at a young age. His lived experience of migration guides his engagement in community building and solidarity work. Rahul advocates for people-centred and rights-based solutions to interconnected issues related to migration, displacement, climate justice, humanitarian affairs, and sustainable development. He is an avid football (soccer) enthusiast and enjoys reading and exploring the city and outdoors in his spare time.
Rama Duwaji is a Syrian illustrator and designer with a BFA in Communication Arts, based between Dubai and Washington, DC. Her work mostly explores social issues such as beauty standards, misogyny and the roles they play in the lives of women of colour and their mental health. Her art takes on different forms such as editorial work, middle school book illustrations and graphic novels.
Raquel Boira is an artist and educator based in Brighton. Her work explores the complexities of self-love in the face of climate extinction and looks at activism and community organising as a means of tackling political disharmony. Alongside her illustration, she works with young people in informal education settings and is currently developing a youth led project using tech to understand sustainability. She also co-creates content with young people around mental health for an online wellbeing service.
Ravinder is a freelance journalist and writer. She often writes opinion and culture pieces on mental health and wellness, and is a recent Journalism graduate from Coventry University.
Reproductive Justice Initiative (previously Decolonising Contraception) is a not-for-profit, community interest company formed by Black and People of Colour working in sexual and reproductive health (SRH). Their team is interdisciplinary and includes sex educators, doctors, campaigners, journalists, researchers and many others.
Rhiannon is a Welsh-Armenian student doctor, researcher and organiser. Her work focuses on on health and climate justice, in particular anti-extractivism, access to medicines and re-imagining health. She loves doing mutual aid work, learning to practise abolition, and trying to work out how to be a healer amidst the violence of colonial capitalism. She is an activist with the People’s Health Movement, a researcher with Centric Lab and a member of other grassroots collectives focussed on building just futures.
Rhythima Shinde is a Mumbaikar based in London. Finding herself in the midst of intersectionality as a Dalit woman, she works in the intersection of environmental education and social justice, via her teaching fellowship at TEDI London, and research in climate finance for emerging economies at ThomasLloyd Group.
Risako has been an avid writer from a young age, writing anything and everything that went on in her life. After studying at a university filled with diversity, she has now shifted her focus on exposing and writing about the small question marks in life.
Robin is a member of Fossil Free London. Fossil Free London is a grassroots climate action group that aims to kick fossil fuel companies and their financiers out of our capital by running collaborative online and street protest campaigns.
Robin Craig writes about taboo sex and why we do it. His writing explores sexuality and kink, with a focus on sexual practices that are often considered non-normative. He is currently writing his first book on the history of perversion. He currently writes a popular Substack newsletter called Looking At Porn that delves into taboo fetishes and what they say about the culture we live in.
Rosa is an illustrator from Merseyside whose work aesthetically is a mix of contemporary illustration combined with the vibrancy of 70s festival posters. It explores social issues such as climate justice, body positivity and feminism.
Rosa O'Mara is an illustrator from South London, drawing inspiration from imagery that deals closely and playfully with colour and form; as well as integrating social commentary where possible.
Rose Gordon-Orr is based in London, currently completing her MA in Postcolonial Culture and Global Policy at Goldsmiths. She is interested in how colonial legacies continue to shape the world we live in, from the way in which it is intertwined with the history of photography, to how it plays out in today’s immigration systems.
Rudy is a disabled queer trans man born and bred in the South Wales Valleys. He holds an MA in English Literature specialising in class, poverty and queerness. He co-founded Trans Aid Cymru in 2020 alongside a group of other trans leftists, and most of his time since then has been spent supporting trans, intersex and non-binary people all over Wales. More recently he has been combining his passion for literature with his advocacy work, penning articles about working-class trans experiences and the issues they face.
Sabba Khan is an award-winning author bringing together visual art, architecture and storytelling into a practice that asks pertinent questions of our times. Sabba Khan’s debut graphic novel The Roles We Play won the Jhalak prize and was one of the Guardian’s best books of the year in 2021. Her graphic novel takes her working-class diasporic roots to interrogate class, race and gender in contemporary life in the UK. The medium of comics and sequential art form a central praxis to her approach, at once accessible and immediate, they are a way to examine and make sense of complex and entangled systems and structures, for both the private and the public
Sabir Zazai is the Chief Executive of Scottish Refugee Council.
Sabrina Gevaerd is a Brazilian born, London based illustrator and visual artist. Her work is and emotional landscape, manifested to translate thoughts into images.
Sabrina Yazid is a graphic designer and illustrator who loves exploring different creative mediums. She really enjoys listening to music – her playlist is almost neverending.
Sadia is a freelance writer based in Kuwait and India. Their writing aims to analyse pop culture through the lens of intersectional feminism and leftist ideologies.
Safiya is a freelance writer based in Amsterdam. She particularly focuses on South Asian identity, music and their intersection. As well as writing, she works on RepresentAsian – the podcast, radio show and club nights exploring South Asian representation in the UK music industry.
Sahar is an installation artist and writer from West London. Her work focuses on identity, displacement and belonging Exploring their many dimensions and complexities. Her last project, Consciousness portrays the on going layers of identities that dwell within us and how that represents beings of a certain disposition. Kun FayaKun – كُنْ فَيَكُونُ – Be, and it is
Salam is a female, Muslim, Palestinian and Guyanese, London-raised fashion and portrait photographer. Her focus has always been to work with POC in as many of my projects as possible with an aim to highlight the talent from minority backgrounds through collaborative projects. Her aim is to diversify the industry through these bodies of work to show that talent lives beyond borders.
Born in Sudan, Sali Mudawi is a dual national of the UK and Sweden, currently living and working between the United Arab Emirates, South Africa and the United Kingdom. Sali's still imagery draws inspiration from structural design, which in parallel, contributed to setting the foundation for her photographic identity. Her eye for detail and dynamism has furthered her practice beyond what meets the eye by capturing cultural heritage reminiscent of Sudan while delving into the narratives behind the lens and subsequently connecting women within the Sudanese diaspora.
Salma Khamis is a freelance writer based in Cairo. With a background in journalism and academia, Salma worked with independent media outlet Mada Masr prior to completing an MA in Comparative Literature at SOAS in 2019. Salma’s academic interests centre around modern and contemporary Arabic literature, women’s writing, and revolutionary culture.
Sam Tulley is a bisexual music producer based in the North West of England, and he is a student at the University of Liverpool, studying Music and Music Technology. He has previously been involved with conservation projects in the Lake District National Park with the aim of protecting the natural environment. More recently, he has worked with filmmakers and other musicians to research the dance music scene in Liverpool, and has investigated the LGBTQIA+ representation in the genre.
Samia is Co-Artistic Director of Lemon House Theatre, and Assistant Producer for Tamasha Theatre. She’s has work staged at Theatre503, The Kings Head, and The Lion and Unicorn.
Samia Dumbuya is a climate justice activist that believes environmental justice does not exist without social justice. She is the co-founder of Seize the Vote, a platform for young people to equip themselves with the tools, knowledge and resources to transform political spaces in the UK.
@seizethevote
Samia is a graphic designer and an artist based in Chandigarh with 12 years of international work experience.
Samra Habib is a writer, photographer, and activist. As a journalist they've covered topics ranging from Muslim fashion trends and dating apps to the rise of Islamophobia in the US. Their portraits have been exhibited at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and are part of the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives’ permanent collection. They work with LGBTQ organizations internationally, raising awareness of issues that impact queer Muslims around the world. We Have Always Been Here is their first book.
Santiago Flores is a climate justice activist, writer, and pianist, based in Mexico City. He is the Founder and International Leader of Saving Tuvalu, Mexico’s Climate Adviser at Child Rights International Network, and an Alumni of the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme. His journey within activism first started when he was 15, by working on initiatives focused on amplifying the narratives of environmentally marginalised communities. A ‘day-dreamer’ that believes in the creation of social change, he has set as a long-lasting mission the reimagination of political systems that ensure ‘a liberation for all populations’.
Sara Bafo is a community organiser, youth worker and educator who reimagines, explores and collectively builds transformative educational programmes and practices. Sara is involved in movements across the UK rooted in anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist and abolitionist practices. Sara's organising is rooted in the belief that liberation is possible and will happen by any means necessary through the power of the people.
Sara el-Solh is a physician-anthropologist, researcher and organiser using health as a lens through which to radically reimagine a just world. Believing that health is fundamentally political, she envisions health systems as part of a flourishing ecosystem of resistance to capitalism, colonialism and all forms of inequality. She works nationally and internationally on a range of issues including climate justice, racism, migration and access to healthcare.
Sara Kärpänen is a Finnish-born, London-based poet, artist and writer. Through her practice, she explores narratives that focus on sexuality, identity and gender equality in the context of urban communities. She is the founder of Women of the Wick—a podcast, poetry and storytelling platform for women and non-binary artists, writers and activists.
Sara is the first ever NUS Vice President Liberation and Equality, a new role created as part of NUS reform. An active participant in the Black Students Campaign and former Liberation and Access Officer at the University of Manchester Students’ Union, Sara is keen to embed liberation across the student movement.
Sarah Gavron directed ROCKS working in a close collaboration with Anu Henriques and the creative team and cast.
Sarah Michal Hamid is a proud Punjabi, Kashmiri and Ashkenazi full spectrum doula, and future midwife. Their family is most recently from Sahiwal, Pakistan, where she first learned to dance in admiration of monsoon rains fracturing the cloak of summer humidity. She works at the National Institute for Reproductive Health in NYC, and sits on the leadership council of the Young Womxn of Colour 4 Reproductive Justice Collective at Advocates for Youth. They believe in a world where reproductive healthcare is accessible, safe, culturally comforting, and respectful for everyone, especially for people in the Global South. She loves to eat mangoes, read, paint, swim, sing ancestral songs, snuggle cats and collect earrings.
Sargam Gupta is an artist and art director whose work has been featured across various publications including Ballpitmag, Vogue Magazine and the Dieline. More recently, she has been helping evolve brands such as Bumble and Uber. She illustrates to express relatable emotions in a bold yet light-hearted way and believes in learning new things everyday.
Sayeeda Bacchus is a Dutch-born Illustrator of Guyanese descent living in London. Her work explores cultural diversity, celebrating cultures and communicating on subjects that are often overlooked.
Scarlett is a climate justice activist and actor, being a leading organiser of the Birmingham school strikes which attracted turnouts of thousands shortly after becoming the youngest person in the world to have an A level in Government and Politics, which she self taught at 13. Her work saw the 2019 protest attracting 450,000 attendees nationally. Since then, she has become a prominent climate policy writer, having contributed to Bills including the English Climate Emergency Education Act which has been supported by numerous political parties. She is the youngest policy-writer globally. She is an award-winning journalist, and lobbies and speaks out for climate justice in Parliaments across the World.
Shagufta K. Iqbal is a writer and filmmaker. She is the author of 'Jam is For Girls, Girls Get Jam' and founder of 'The Yoniverse' Collective.
Shahed is a freelance writer, and has written for publications such as Vice, Tribune, and Stylist. She's also the Deputy Editor of Aurelia Magazine.
Shahida Rahman was born and raised in Cambridge, UK. Her late father, Abdul Karim, moved to Cambridge from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) in 1957, and her mother arrived in 1964. She is an author of historical fiction, particularly focusing on and raising awareness of South Asian history and heritage, which she has been doing for the last 10 years. She has won numerous civic and cultural awards for her work. She has undertaken several voluntary roles. Shahida is a trustee of Karim Foundation, which aims to relieve poverty by providing food and support with domestic costs for those in financial hardship in Cambridge.
Shailja Khati is a design generalist from India working as a learning experience designer in the education and cultural sector. Her work focuses on bringing people to art and art to people. She believes the right art at the right time has the power to change the world. Best work of art – Butter chicken and Biryani!
Shams Hanieh is a Palestinian-Algerian writer and researcher. She holds an Msc in Development Management from the London School of Economics, and her work has been published in GQ Middle East, Trippin' World, and AZEEMA, among others. She currently works in sexual health advocacy, and her writing and research interests include, but are not limited to, Arabic hip-hop and experimental music, visual art, Palestinian women's resistance, and informal solidarity mechanisms.
Signe Sofie Hansen is based in Beirut where she is working on her social enterprise start-up Hala Collective, which aims to empower people and protect the planet through sustainable and inclusive leakproof panties for people with periods and incontinence. She is also an experienced researcher and practitioner with six years of professional experience focusing on displacement, social cohesion, gender equality and sustainable development in fragile contexts, in particular in South-West Asia and North Africa (SWANA).
Simmone is a climate justice campaigner, writer and educator who has contributed to environmental, social and cultural work in Bristol, London and across the UK. Simmone has worked on air pollution, divestment and direct action campaigns. She currently uses facilitated workshops to explore climate colonialism and examples of climate resistance and movements from the past and present day. Simmone is an astrology enthusiast - she's an aries sun, moon and Scorpio rising. Simmone loves music, hates capitalism and likes looking at the bright side of things!
Simón Sedillo is a Professional Partner with the Earlham College’s Border Studies Program based out of Arizona. Simón is also a community rights defence organiser, filmmaker, educator, artist, and the author of “Weapons, Drugs, and Money: Crime, Corruption, and Community Based Liberation in the US/Mexico Neoliberal Military Political Economy”. For the last 15 years, Simón has been teaching geopolitics and political economy.
SimOne is a contemporary artist whose work has been shown in venues across London. She specialises in paint and is known for her signature use of colour and distinctive style that blends abstraction and portraiture.
She's regularly commissioned and facilitates art workshops and panels.
Simran is a writer, editor and community organiser based in East London. They work across disciplines in poetry, journalism, lyric essays and translation. Recent work includes an essay on mischief and liberation for trans people of colour in London sex spaces (for Skin Deep), a headline performance at Somerset House for Daytimers, and a workshop for the Barbican Conservatory, blending yoga, live sound and poetry.
Siobhán McGuirk is a researcher, educator, curator and journalist , focused on queer cultures, migration, social justice movements and creative and collaborative methods. They are an editor of Red Pepper magazine and co-editor of the book Asylum for Sale: Profit and Protest in the Migration Industry
Sofia Akel is an educationalist, published researcher and academic, campaigning to tackle institutional racism in education. Currently, she is leading London Metropolitan University’s race equity work. Sofia also holds a number of writing and consultancy roles from publishing to music videos.
Sofia Bensadon is an independent visual storyteller and student of Anthropology at the National University of San Martin, Argentina. Her current work has been greatly inspired by different types of non-western crafts carried out by women. Her practice concentrates on long-term processes of experimental research. Her tools: her own body, a Rolleiflex camera, and a zoom recorder.
Solange is a podcaster, poet, and writer whose identity as a Trinidadian immigrant informs much of how she sees the world. Coming from one of the most diverse islands in the Caribbean makes her even more passionate about diverse storytelling, cultural diffusion, and having empathy and understanding for those around her. She is the creator of the Blog, Tips From Your Good Sis, and the podcast, Beauty, Brains & Baggage, two platforms aimed at highlighting and sharing the experiences of marginalised communities. Solange is a Boston University alum and is based in Fort Lauderdale, FL.
Sophia is a designer, researcher and survivor-activist focusing on intersectionalities within child sexual abuse. She is the founder of Secrets Worth Sharing, a podcast, event and educational platform giving people practical and approachable advice for talking about childhood sexual abuse with 'serious joy'.
Sophie is a Brussels-based illustrator specialising in editorial and children's illustration. Her work is inspired by transgenerational life stories, between psychogenealogy and sociology. She is sensitive to the themes of climate justice, feminism, slow travel, interculturality, botany, animals as sentient beings... She likes to notice the small details that make a difference.
Stan describes their work as 'Observational Landscape photography', as they have always felt that their projects straddle multiple genres. They use traditional landscape photography methods through the use of slow and careful composition with medium format film cameras.
Stephanie Teng is an artist working at the intersection of the liminal and the subliminal. Her practice examines the tension and tenderness between emotional states that cultivate resilience in the face of fear. Rooted in experiences of generational displacement, her work moves from the personal to the political, creating spaces where notions of identity, oppression, migration, grief, and healing are explored through the framework of decolonisation. Stephanie investigates how trauma reshapes perception; how language connects us to universal truths; and how bringing the darker parts of the subconscious into light can transport us to new states of empowerment. Drawing inspiration from Jungian concepts of the collective unconscious, her work seeks to create moments of synchronicity through the alchemy of material, spatial, and psychological interactions.
Steve Williams is a writer and freelance journalist based in Nairobi, Kenya. His interests include: Global North and South divide, modern day neo-imperialism via militarism, progressive politics and left unity and also inequalities faced by Global South dwellers. He enjoys chess and while he is not writing, he is doing obscure research or learning a new (programming & linguistic) language. He is shado's Reddit Manager. He hopes to see the end of borders in his lifetime.
Stine Greve is a Danish artist and illustrator making fat and queer art for magical people.
Svetlana Onye is a writer, singer, and the founder of Not Actually Radical, an educational platform that empowers the diasporic community to unlearn and imagine new futures through knowledge and storytelling. Her literary and academic work focuses on environmental justice, feminism, and the effects of colonialism on societal structures, consciousness, and the interaction between humans and the natural world. Her dissertation, "A False Conscious Liberation: How Colonial Christianity Was Used as A Weapon to Break Down the Traditional Igbo Tribe", was published.
Syed Jazib Ali is a writer and media practitioner committed to amplifying marginalised voices and advocating climate justice. With a career rooted in powerful storytelling, Jazib has gained international acclaim for crafting decolonized narratives that challenge the status quo and drive social change.
Talia is a photographer, filmmaker and multimedia producer focused on the intersections of environmental and social justice. She has over five years experience organising within and documenting various movements for social change, both within the UK and Internationally, and most recently has been at the forefront of organising for Palestine, both as a Jewish activist and as a creative.
Tallulah Brennan is a writer based in Yorkshire, interested in exploring the complexity of political ecology, abolition feminism, and food justice, and how all ecological crises intersect. She has written for Abolitionist Futures, Filler Zine, and student-run journal Earth Rise, amongst others. Tallulah is committed to 'eco-media' as a form of environmental justice, and finding ways to communicate within the framework of slow, radical and community-led knowledge and skills sharing.
Tammy Gan is a digital creator and communicator and focuses her work on climate justice and building regenerative futures through and with love. She is currently the Head of Content and Storytelling at Advaya, Production Manager at Green Dreamer Podcast, and is a member of the Bad Activist Collective, and thus can be found on various corners of the internet.
Tara Michaela is a Black, queer sex educator based in Philadelphia and New York. She is the founder of The Youth Sexpert Program, a non-profit training program that aims to provide comprehensive sex education for high school aged youth, so they can become their community's sex expert. Her work focuses primarily on how injustice manifests in sexual interactions. She uses her social media platforms and written pieces to connect with her community on these issues.
Tara Tadlock is a freelance travel and culture writer and essayist who has been published in various digital and print publications. Her writing focuses on ethical travel and human rights issues. She believes in the power of storytelling. She has worked as a contractor for the US Embassy in Laos, where she also helps run a social enterprise that promotes sustainable tourism in Luang Prabang. Originally from the US, Tara was raised in England and attended university in New Zealand.
Tara Wight is the Scotland campaigns coordinator for the Landworkers’ Alliance, a union for farmers, crofters, growers, foresters and other land-based workers interested in building a better food and farming system.
Tatiana Garavito is a facilitator, organiser, and lifelong student dedicated to exploring the intersections of migration, race, and climate justice. With extensive experience in social justice leadership and liberation processes, she also co-leads care & repair initiatives at Tipping Point UK. Tatiana is also a member of the Post-extractive Futures collective, dedicated to building networks of solidarity, nurturing dreams, fostering co-inspiration, and sharing essential skills for ongoing struggles within a broader framework of care and reparative justice.
Teresa Di Mauro is an Italian freelance journalist who focuses on Caucasus affairs, migrations, minorities and conflicts. She is currently an Erasmus Mundus masters student in journalism at Charles University, in Prague.
The Landworkers' Alliance is a grassroots union of farmers, foresters and land-based workers in the UK. It works to defend its members interests and to create a more just and sustainable food and land-use system for all. Yali works with the Landworkers' Alliance to develop strategic communications for its policy and campaigns work.
The Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) is an independent, grassroots, transnational base-building organisation of Palestinian and Arab youth living in exile and committed to the liberation of our homeland and people. The PYM comprises 14 chapters across North America and Europe.
Thumy Phan is a Vietnamese immigrant illustrator currently based in Oklahoma City. She loves telling stories with her work, specifically BIPOC stories and her own experiences of growing up in the US as a Vietnamese, immigrant, permanent resident raised in the south. To make sure these narratives are heard, loud and clear, she uses e a combination of bold colours, flora, organic shapes, and a sprinkle of magical swirls.
Tigs is the founder of Reclaim the Sea, a non-profit that provides tools to enable people to reclaim the sea as a safe space when it has previously been one of trauma. Tigs is the founder of Reclaim the Sea, a non-profit that provides tools to enable people to reclaim the sea as a safe space when it has previously been one of trauma.
Tinuke Fagborun is a British Nigerian illustrator living in London. She celebrates diverse storytelling, her art is a colourful and optimistic response to the dominant narrative surrounding women of colour in media and the art world. She creates illustrations in which women are uncensored, empowered, otherworldly and the architects of their own rich stories.
Tiyanna is a British Indian writer, poet, and social media assistant born and raised in Leicester. Her writing mainly covers topics within the South Asian diaspora, as well as climate justice, the arts, and cultural diversity.
Born in London, Tobi Onabolu is an artist and writer who lives nomadically with a base in Grand Popo, Benin Republic. He works in an interdisciplinary and collaborative style predominantly across moving-image, poetry, and performance. Interrogating the process of inner child reconnection, Tobi uses his body and lived experience as a conceptual point of departure. His practice is concerned with expanding consciousness through space and across time as an avenue for personal and collective healing. Playing with breathwork, movement, and dance, his work evokes the ethereal, considering humans beyond their physical form, as energetic and spiritual beings.
Tom is a furniture and product designer, always looking for unique and exciting ways to create better solutions without the fuss. For him, the materiality is essential in the understanding and purity of an object.
Tony Cobb is an inside prison journalist based in Florida's Everglades Correctional Institution. He reports on prison conditions and writes about prison reform through personal essays. He has written for Prism, Scalawag, and the Prison Journalism Project.
Tony Vick is incarcerated in Tennessee serving two life sentences. He is the author of 'Secrets from a Prison Cell: A Convict’s Eyewitness Accounts of the Dehumanizing Drama of Life Behind.'
Tyrone is a social justice and political activist and currently works as a Senior Movement Building and Activism Officer for War on Want. Tyrone has also been a member of the Green Party for 8 years and recently stood to be Deputy Leader of the party, coming in second. He has also ran in multiple local election campaigns, narrowly missing out on election by 27 votes in a local by-election in 2022. Tyrone has featured in books, articles and other media relating to Climate and Social Justice and has also provided written contributions to a number of publications.
Unee is a Vancouver-based writer and illustrator who loves Paris, French cinema, the works of existentialism, and a glass of good wine. Her novel Crista and August in Aloy is a heartwarming and haunting love story about two lost souls transforming their lives by embracing each other’s troubled past.
Valentina Prada Flórez is a Literature student and documentary photographer based in Bogotá, Colombia. Valentina has extensive knowledge and is primarily interested in documenting human rights issues with focus on climate and gender as well as experience documenting social outbreaks in their country.
Venetia La Manna is a fair fashion campaigner. Throughout her social media platforms, Venetia challenges fashion brands who are costing the earth and calls out retailers on their unethical practices. Venetia hosts a podcast series called All The Small Things, in which she interviews experts about issues related to social and climate justice. She is the co-founder of Remember Who Made Them which aims to energise a new solidarity economy in fashion; seeking to uplift the voices and demands of garment makers. In 2022, Venetia was featured in the Channel 4 documentary ‘Inside Shein’.
Vivek Ramachandran is a non-binary learning scientist who is creating ways to teach ethics and social justice to engineering students through empathy and reflection. He is happiest when he's listening to people's stories, learning new languages, or dancing tango. He is actively seeking collaborations with Indigenous and Dalit communities across the world.
Walker Gawande is a US-born illustrator living in Skopje, North Macedonia. He currently works as a freelance illustrator for Unbias The News, a feminist cross-border newsroom based in Berlin. He is also an aspiring drummer and lover of spices.
Originally from Scotland, Wallis now lives in London where she works in NGO communications, with a focus on health. She has been campaigning with LIARC since the start of the year but her passion for the cause was sparked by her masters thesis looking at Irish media's coverage of the abortion debate prior to the referendum. Before living in London, she studied in Amsterdam where she volunteered as a Youth Advocate for CHOICE for Youth and Sexuality, an NGO advocating for meaningful youth participation in national and international decisions on SRHR.
Wangchuk Dema is a feminist activist working on gender, gender-based violence, sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) including safe abortion rights and above all smashing the patriarchy. Her other areas of focus are LGBTQIA+, green menstruation, women in politics and women leadership. She has been a young leader herself all her life.
Wei Wu is a Chinese illustrator based in London, and she graduated from MA illustration and Animation of Kingston University of Art in 2022. As a female artist, the themes of her work often revolve around female identity, intimacy, and social phenomena.
Will is a final year graphic design student studying at Kingston School of Art. As a designer his projects often work in two halves, the big idea and the art direction, to communicate a clear and contextual narrative targeted at an audience. Therefore, he would describe himself increasingly as much an art director as he is a graphic designer.
Will Pippin is a Sicilian-American photographer based in Brooklyn, NY. His work is driven by his curiosity for social and cultural subjects.
Working Chance is the UK’s only employment charity solely for women with convictions. We support women with experience of the criminal justice system to develop the confidence, skills and self-belief to overcome barriers to their employment and to rebuild their lives and thrive.
Xandan Gulley is a transgender man incarcerated under the legal name Britney Gulley in a Texas prison. Xandan has spent over 12 years in solitary confinement for his gender identity and as retribution for his exposés unveiling the inhumane conditions that transgenders face daily. Xandan was a 2023 recipient for the Ridgeway Reporting Project grant.
Xoài David is a Franco-Vietnamese writer, illustrator, and Third Culture Kid based in Paris. She is one of the xo-founders of Organisation to Decolonise International Schools (ODIS) and has hosted and performed at the Spoken Word Paris open mic scene for many years. After obtaining a degree in Book Design at Ecole Estienne, she did community work centring around the charity shop organisation La Petite Rockette – a more local version of Oxfam with DiY and grassroots workshops. She then obtained an MA in Creative Writing the University of Kent.
Yara Dowani is a farmer, activist, and researcher from Jerusalem. Yara’s interest in farming started in 2017 after joining a permaculture design course. After the course, she traveled to Spain to visit sustainable projects and farms. Coming back to Palestine she joined a research group studying perennial plants and edible wild plants in Palestine. Since 2018 she has been part of Om Sleiman farm's team and is part of many initiatives and movements working on agroecology and food sovereignty. Now Yara’s interest lies mostly in the educational part of resistant farming and cooperatives forming.
Yasmina Nuny is a Bissau-Guinean writer and poet with a background in political economy and African Studies. She currently works as a communications assistant at a local Guinean NGO and does some freelance writing on the side. Some of her work can be found on her blog and her debut poetry collection, Anos Ku Ta Manda, is out with Verve Poetry Press.
Born in Sudan and raised in the diaspora, Yassmin Abdel-Magied is an award-winning social advocate and author of the essay collection 'Talking About a Revolution.'
Yume is Editor in Chief of B.G.U. and a graduate student of Media and Language Analysis. She is currently based in Tokyo, researching the exploitation and co-optation of queer themes in popular culture. Breaking normative boundaries (& sometimes glasses) one zine & bottle of wine at a time, she spends her time researching, reflecting, writing, & exploring the world of gender & queerness. She’s also trying to laugh at & love herself a little more every day. She has a tattoo that says "be the strange you wish to see in the world" by bald, badass drag queen, Sasha Velour. It is a reminder that we must embody the change, which others will often perceive as strange.
Yuzhen Cai is a freelance illustrator and researcher living in London. Originally from China, her mixed cultural background grounded her illustration interests in community, communication and cross-cultural issues. She hopes to use her practice to communicate and engage with narratives of multi-cultures for a wider social impact. She is also passionate about children’s picture books on migration.
Zafirah Zein is a writer on the environment and human rights beat. An old soul with restless feet, she is constantly dreaming of time traveling in history or her next adventure out of the city.
Zainab is a freelance writer and content creator from London. Her writing and Instagram content focus on slow fashion and climate justice, in particular where they intersect with social justice. She is Green Fashion Editor for climate change magazine It’s Freezing in LA!, has written for gal-dem amongst other online platforms, and collaborated with Fashion Revolution.
Zoë Miller is a graduate in Human Geography and Politics & International Relations from Durham University, currently undertaking a research internship with Manushya Foundation, an Asia regional non-governmental organisation based in Bangkok that promotes community empowerment to advance human rights and social justice. Zoë was born in Thailand but grew up in Southeast London.