From early civilization, storytelling has been at the heart of our culture, whether acted out, written, or spoken through generations. Stories in all their forms play a crucial role in advancing social change by connecting with people on an emotional level, inspiring empathy and understanding.
With this intentionality, The Foundation has invested in six community partners across various mediums, including newspapers, podcasts, theater, and a live talk show. Our Narrative Shift and Culture Change partners represent non-mainstream media, focusing on diverse topics and communities to promote racial and gender justice and civic engagement.
The Foundation’s support stands out in philanthropy. We provide early seed grants and five-year investments with unrestricted funding, leaving the decision-making power in the hands of community leaders. Multi-year investments and trust-based funding are crucial because building community and momentum takes time. Likewise, narrative shift and culture change takes time, and it is often difficult to measure. Assessing the impact requires finding interrelated, observable changes in the type of stories in circulation, common images, themes, metaphors, symbols, language, and changes in behaviors, norms, mindsets and attitudes.
Strategic and financial support has created an ecosystem of media organizations led by and for women of color, counteracting negative stereotypes and shifting public perspectives toward community-led solutions to economic, gender, and racial inequity. Alongside our investment, we provide a space for community partners to connect, learn, and grow together.
We know that even a small investment can lead to lasting change. Now, we aim to better understand how The Foundation, and philanthropy as a whole, influences our community partners’ ability to reach their communities. By exploring the relationship between unrestricted, seed-stage funding and the growth of community partners that challenge dominant narratives, we can assess the impact of philanthropy on media landscapes. The results may shift how philanthropy makes future investments.
Individually, our community partners have built success. These six distinct organizations, serving diverse audiences on local, national, and global scales, are shifting narratives in their fields. Now we seek to understand how their collective impact is greater than the sum of their parts. To take their work to the next stage, individual community partners can continue to grow and attract investment by leaning on the collective. Just as a seed grows into a tree and eventually a forest, we expect our trust-based philanthropy in the media sector can prove to be transformative, reshaping the narrative for future generations.
The Futuro Media Group, first funded by The Foundation in 2016, creates multimedia content for and about the new American mainstream in the service of empowering people to navigate the complexities of an increasingly diverse and connected world. Futuro Media recognizes the urgent need for stories that shift harmful paradigms related to democracy, white supremacy, migration, exclusion, health disparities, and climate change. In 2022, it reached a collective audience of 14.1 million, more than doubling its 2017 reach.
Futuro Media’s founder, Maria Hinojosa, has had a valuable impact on stopping the use of the slur “illegal” when referring to human beings. She has introduced this change into the U.S. media ecosystem, and others have followed to insist on the change as well.
In 2023, the organization received the Nonprofit News Award for Journalism Collaboration for “Head Down,” in which Futuro Investigates and Latino USA, in partnership with Prism, explored how a visa program that brings more than 300,000 foreign agricultural workers to the U.S. every year is plagued with abuse and wage theft.
Photo: Futuro Media
Laura Flanders & Friends, originally funded in 2016, brings in-depth discussions about racial, gender, economic, and environmental justice to public television and radio. Every week, award-winning journalist Laura Flanders invites activists, artists, journalists, scholars, and impacted community members into conversations about the strategies they’re using to build a better future. The show’s programming is appreciated by station programmers because it showcases movements that are ignored by other media outlets. Their partnership with American Public Television allows them to reach a growing and widespread audience, including rural communities across the country.
Since partnering with The Foundation, the show has seen an increase in donations. Last year, they became a first-time grantee of the California Women’s Foundation and saw an increase in individual giving, with 50% more new donors during their year-end fundraising season compared to the previous year.
The 19th News, an independent nonprofit newsroom reporting on gender, politics, and policy, was initially funded by The Foundation in 2023. It covers issues affecting women and LGBTQ+ people, such as abortion, education, justice, and representation, aiming to challenge power structures and uplift historically underrepresented audiences.
Amid significant upheaval for women’s and LGBTQ+ rights, the team grew from 3 to nearly 60, reaching a diverse audience. The latest survey found that half of their audience identifies as BIPOC. The 19th News encourages reader engagement through annual polls, live events, and callouts. Last year, about 2,500 community members attended events, responded to surveys, or joined the volunteer program.
The 19th also partners with 70 and growing newsrooms through its republishing platform, including nonprofits like the Louisiana Illuminator and Honolulu Civil Beat, and major outlets like USA Today and Ms. Magazine. Additionally, they have collaborated with The Foundation’s community partners on events, such as the Poderistas.
Photo credit: Poderistas
Poderistas, funded beginning in 2021, celebrates Latina culture and harnesses community. The organization uses storytelling, convening, and organizing to shift la cultura, build lasting confidence, and inspire a lifestyle of civic participation among Latinas. Their mission is to build a community that informs, celebrates, and motivates Latinas to take action for themselves and their community in order to harness power in the voting booth and beyond.
Poderistas is working on establishing partnerships with grassroots organizations in each city where they host convenings. Additionally, they plan to collaborate with national organizations that have tools and infrastructures they can leverage in their own community.
Theatre of the Oppressed NYC received funding from The Foundation in 2017 to support its partnerships with community members at local organizations to form theatre troupes. These troupes devise and perform plays based on their challenges confronting economic inequality, racism, and other social, health and human rights injustices. After each performance, actors and audiences engage in theatrical brainstorming – called Forum Theatre – with the aim of catalyzing creative change on the individual, community, and political levels.
Photo credit: Theater of the Oppressed
TransLash Media, funded since 2021, shares trans stories to save lives. It serves as a reliable source for journalists, activists, and those seeking accurate narratives about the trans community. Amidst growing disinformation about trans people, TransLash provides hope through community voices, combating authoritarianism and protecting democracy. Through various media formats, including video, podcasts, and written content, they educate and inform.
Community involvement is central to TransLash’s mission. They forge partnerships with trans and social justice organizations, particularly Black trans women of color and those leading efforts in the South. Collaborations with PBS, WNET, and others strengthen trans storytelling efforts, featuring voices from groups like My Sistahs House and the Black LGBTQ+ Migrant Project. TransLash also engages with mainstream outlets like The Guardian and NBC to amplify community perspectives.
In June 2023, TransLash launched Artistic Legacies, highlighting the Black Trans Femmes in the Arts Collective, as part of LGBTQ+ Pride Month commemorations.
Imara Jones, Founder of TransLash Media (Photo credit: Translash Media)
Advance Justice For Women
