Explorations of Compassion:
The Lived Experiences of Young Women Refugees and Their Communities
We are Footage
At Footage, our vision is a world where every person feels seen, heard, and worthy. Established over 15 years ago by five women PhD colleagues at Cambridge University, we are a thriving global feminist organization dedicated to serving women, gender-expansive, LGBTQIA+, and marginalized groups globally through innovative feminist research interventions with a focus on gender-based violence, forced displacement, and inequities. Our work resides at the intersection of applied social science research, humanitarian initiatives, and grassroots development.
Recognized with 12 Public Diplomacy awards from the U.S. Department of State, we operate across 4 continents in spaces ranging from refugee camps to hostile contexts. We strive to integrate the voices and experiences of marginalized communities and geographies into policy discussions.
Our approach is trauma-informed, evidence-based, and inclusive. Feminist research guides our work, combining participatory, arts-based, narrative methods, human-centered design, and advocacy. We advance the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Agenda, and Feminist Foreign Policy (FFP) principles. We prioritize meaningful engagement to ensure that each intervention drives tangible change.
With 15 years of social impact on digital and geographic frontiers, we have worked with some of the world’s most marginalized girls, women, and communities including those who have survived conflict in Syria, torture by ISIS, horrors in camps in Libya, and those fleeing persecution from dangerous hostile governments and geographies. Thus far, we have designed over eight interventions delivered in twelve countries across four continents; cultivated compassion, connection, and leadership globally; and provided online spaces for participant narratives and lived experiences.
Our Girl-talk-Girl online platform is the largest digital storytelling platform connecting young women and focusing on gender-based violence globally. Through “dialogue diplomacy,” we create authentic spaces, emphasizing compassion in action and bridging gaps between research, programming, reporting, and policy-making.
Our crisis-ready solutions use narrative and expressive approaches to uplift women, LGBTQIA+, gender-expansive, and marginalized groups around the world to connect as agents of change. Our interventions provide connection—a community for those on the frontlines of inequities where their ideas matter and their voices count. We believe compassion and connection are as essential to sustainable development as food and water.
Programs & Methods
FemSMS: Compassionate text-based information for women in Ukraine & crisis zones.
The network aims to provide women in crisis in Ukraine with rapid access to information and resources.
PowerTools Kyrgyzstan: Tools for Dialogue and Collaboration to End GBV
This collaborative initiative, led by Footage Foundation in partnership with Kyrgyz El Agartuu Public Association, aims to enhance the capacity of Kyrgyz civil society and government to address gender-based violence (GBV) through an integrated approach involving research, workshops, and advocacy. Funded by the U.S. Embassy in the Kyrgyz Republic and the U.S. Department of State, the project will deliver a comprehensive needs assessment, interactive workshops, and a Stakeholder Summit, focused on building skills, shifting cultural norms, and fostering productive collaborations. It culminates in a detailed white paper with recommendations for methodological and policy improvements. Together, these efforts work to create a safer, more equitable Kyrgyz Republic by empowering local stakeholders to lead in GBV prevention.
Compassionate Cash: Unconditional cash assistance.
Our program distributes cash to those inside Ukraine, primarily to single mothers, families, elderly women, non-Ukrainian citizens, minority populations, and disabled
individuals, promoting security, safety, and dignity.
StrengthIN: Where Wellbeing Meets Global Transformation
Invest in the world’s first evidence-based initiative focused on overlooked human needs including self-worth & connection━ needs virtually ignored in global crises.
Girl-talk-Girl: Mobile Digital Storytelling and Gender- based Violence
Through this project, young women at risk of experiencing gender-based violence (GBV) engage in mVoiceWorks©, then produce and share mobile digital stories based on their lived experiences. Their stories serve as a platform to spark peer-to-peer dialogue internationally, exploring both unique and common experiences with respect to the GBV that is ever-present in the lives of young women.
United States and Russia: From 2014-2016, funded by two awards from the US State Department, Girl-talk-Girl developed and scaled a dynamic collaboration between young women in New York City and St. Petersburg.
Ukraine: In 2017, with funding from the US Embassy in Ukraine, Footage implemented Girl-talk-Girl with young women internally displaced by armed conflict in Eastern Ukraine and Crimea.
Chile: In 2018, with funding from the US Embassy in Chile, Footage implemented Girl-talk-Girl with first generation women students in the School of Psychology at Pontifica Universidad Católica de Chile.
Kazakhstan: In 2022, Footage will continue Girl-talk-Girl in Almaty Kazakhstan — scaling up the program through our unique peer leadership model and delivering training for crisis centers across the region. In 2020, Footage implemented Girl-talk-Girl with university students and young women survivors of violence in Almaty, Kazakhstan. This project is sponsored and supported by the U.S. Diplomatic Mission to Kazakhstan.
Her{connect}Her: Narratives and Connection among Young Refugee and Migrant Women
This program engages young refugee and migrant women worldwide in empowering narrative workshops. Through story sharing, Her{connect}Her cultivates participants' innate agency, belonging, and resilience while fostering compassion and empathy among local and global communities. Hope, dignity, and community are significant themes as this project prioritizes young women as experts on their needs and agents of change while offering them an inclusive network. For this work, Footage was granted a Vodafone Americas Foundation Give Away Award. Thus far, Footage has provided Her{connect}her in Sweden, France, Greece, and the UK.
WebinHERS: Dialogue, Inclusion, and Gender-based Violence
After consulting with young women throughout the US and Eurasia, as well as the professionals who work with them, we will be providing in-depth educational and interactive webinars on GBV in 2020. This project takes an intersectional and participatory approach and is funded by a Peer-to-Peer Dialogue Program Award from the US State Department.
mVoiceWorks
mVoiceWorks© is a unique participatory voice methodology used in our programs that includes workshops, mobile digital storytelling, and (where needed) human-centered design.
