Hi Olushola,
thanks for working on efforts like this. I think it's definitely our
African communities that should be the judge of what shape works best for
an award like this. Out of curiosity, as a way for us all to learn and
maybe for Africans among us who want to participate in this conversation
that you refer to, could you link to where this conversation/consultation
is happening?
I hope you can perhaps also clarify whether 'in English' means that the
original article has to be available in English, or that some translation
should be available in English. I think the former would be much more
restrictive than the latter, especially if some translation resources
(including community resources) are available.
Best,
Lodewijk
On Thu, May 4, 2023 at 1:48 PM Olushola Olaniyan <olaniyanshola15(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
*Dear all, *
*My name is Olushola (User: Olaniyan Olushola). I am from Africa and have
been a Wikimedia since 2014 and passionate about language. I co-lead the
Oral History documentation of Nigerian indigenous languages ( see more
about it **here*
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Nigerian_Language_Oral_History_Documentation_Project/Gallery>
* ). *I am part and parcel of the working group for this Journalism
Award. Together with other community members and some foundation staff, we
have co-created the submission guidelines and award criteria, including
that articles should be English language articles published in a major
outlet.
Everything regarding the rationale for this award is being done in
consultation with members of our African communities, aligned with our
goals to increase exposure for the work we love in the region and close
knowledge gaps.
One thing to mention is that articles about Africa, especially written by
journalists with a local perspective, must be better represented in our
language Wikipedias, including English.
With this being a brand-new initiative, it was the best time to learn.
It is a pilot, and we all see this as an experiment to draw more attention
to journalists' important role as content creators on Wikipedia.
You will agree that we need to celebrate existing journalism excellence
that helps fill knowledge gaps online.
The working group conferred, and since this is a pilot, we decided
together that it was a good idea to consider the need to limit the scope to
collect data and insights easily. We understand the sentiment behind
language in Africa and beyond, and we always wanted to keep everything
simple. We know that no language is superior to the other, so this is a
pilot. From here, we will likely assess the impact we can have before
scaling.
We wish to expand this initiative with more regional volunteers should it
succeed - and we hope it will.
We already have more than a hundred entries!
Thank you
Shola
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