The TRANSform Culture program is actively recruiting storytellers who are both BIPOC and Transgender, Two-Spirit, Nonbinary, and/or Intersex. This is a paid opportunity to take part in our work to TRANSform Culture across the Pacific Northwest.
How it Works:
Pride Foundation engages in story-collection activities directly through its network of TRANSform Culture fellows in conjunction with the Director of CARE. Stories typically consist of artwork, blogs, essays, oral interviews, and video recordings, with flexibility around media format.
These stories are shared with Pride Foundation through an appointment with a CARE Department staff member. At this time, we are only accepting narrative media that can be digitally transferable with the hope of expanding or partnering around physical collection in the future. To schedule a story-sharing appointment, please email the Director of CARE (omni@pridefoundation.org).
If you are a BIPOC Trans+ individual interested in sharing your story or an organization interested in hosting an event to gather BIPOC Trans+ stories, please reach out to Director of CARE, Omni (they/them), to discuss how to make your event a reality. Additionally, please contact the Director if you’re interested in sharing your story and/or have any requests to make the process more accessible and secure for you to participate.
Past Project Spotlight: Building Connection and Empathy Through Virtual Reality
In 2017, TRANSform Culture collaborated on the project, Authentically Us, a series of short documentary films that tell the stories of trans people in our region using 360˚ filmmaking and Virtual Reality. The hope with this project was to create the opportunity for people to see, hear, and in some sense feel the realities of the lived experience of community members in order to build empathy and a stronger sense of connection to our shared humanity.
In partnership with filmmaker Jesse Ayala Jr. of Fovrth Studio, these Virtual Reality (VR) films are part of Oculus’s VR for Good Creators Lab. This recently established project pairs filmmakers and nonprofits to make great VR in the name of social good.
In 2018, we were thrilled to announce that one of these films, Authentically Us: We’re Still Here, was named an official selection at South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Festival, and another, Authentically Us: She Flies By Her Own Wings, was named an official selection at Tribeca and Cannes Film Festivals. You can experience these films and many others at https://www.authenticallyus.com/