Frieda Werden, a radio producer with a long involvement with women and media activism, is one of the recipients of WIFP’s 2022 Women and Media Award. She will be in Washington, DC, at WIFP’s 50th Anniversary celebration October 23rd where all the Award recipients will be announced. If you do not already know Frieda, you will enjoy reading about this impressive woman.

Frieda Lindfield Werden is Series Producer of the long-running radio series WINGS: Women’s International News Gathering Service.  The series is produced in collaboration with women radio producers from around the world, and distributed to community radio stations in multiple countries.

Prior to co-founding WINGS, Frieda had a background in radio production with Longhorn Radio Network and National Public Radio.  She also worked in print media and as Associate Curator of the Texas Women’s History Project (1979-81), under curator Ruthe Winegarten; and she collaborated on some of Ruthe’s books, notably Black Texas Women: 150 Years of Trial and Triumph (University of Texas Press.) A slogan she later wrote for WINGS was “Today’s News is Tomorrow’s History – Keep Women’s Actions on the Record!”

Frieda has a lifelong passion for hearing and telling women’s stories from women’s points of view.  As a 5-year-old on her first day of Sunday School she spoke out against the story of Adam and Eve.  Her first radio series for LRN was 13 episodes about feminist activism released under the mundane title “Women Today.” Also in the 1970s, at the Austin Women’s Center, she joined founding editor Carol Stalcup in creating a tabloid publication called Texan Woman. Among other things, it made fun of the editorial process of Texas Monthly Magazine (where Frieda was then employed).

In 1981, Frieda moved to New York and was hired by NPR docudrama producer Jo Ellyn Rackleff — first as associate producer of an NEH-funded radio series about Willa Cather, and then as Series Producer for 13 docudramas on Latin American fiction writers, also funded by NEH.  Frieda moved to Washington DC to manage that project.  She herself produced the two programs about women writers in that series – one on Mexican writer Elena Poniatowska, and one on Brazilian Clarice Lispector.

As the Reagan administration got underway, the National Endowment for the Humanities came under the control of extreme right-winger Lynne Cheney, making federal funds inaccessible for anything Frieda wanted to do.  She applied for funding to produce a drama by 10^th century German canoness Hrotswitha, but even that was considered too feminist.

Meanwhile, Frieda got hired at Current public broadcasting newspaper as editor for radio and emerging technologies.  It was there that she discovered Dr. Donna Allen’s Media Report to Women.  Donna’s concept of media in which the women covered speak for themselves made a strong impression on Frieda, and contributed to the founding of WINGS.

In 1985, Frieda was offered the job of managing Western Public Radio – a training and production facility in San Francisco.  Part of the incentive to move there from Washington DC was the opportunity to produce a project of her choice.  On arrival in the Bay Area she connected up with community radio producer Katherine Davenport, who was volunteering for the Women’s Department of community radio KPFA in Berkeley. Katherine had formerly co-produced a program at the New York City Pacifica community radio station WBAI, with Judie Pasternak. Frieda and Judie convened a Women’s Caucus meeting at a conference of the National Federation of Community Broadcasters in DC. Katherine and Judie’s show was titled “51%: The Women’s News” (not to be confused with a later women’s radio show out of Albany titled 51%). They made phone calls to women around the world to get their news stories, and had once asked Frieda to cover a story in DC. That sparked Frieda’s interest in the news genre.

Katherine and Frieda moved in together and started working on creating an international women’s news project. The pilot for WINGS, produced by Katherine Davenport, Augusta del Zotto, and Frieda, was funded with a director’s discretionary grant made by Sandra Rattley, from NPR’s Satellite Program Development Fund. The pilot debuted on the Public Radio Satellite in May of 1986.  The idea was to do ongoing follow-up of the international connections women had made during the UN Decade for Women (1975-85).  Frieda had attended the first UN Women’s Conference in Mexico City in 1975, but had not had a chance to go to the others, in Denmark and Nairobi.

Initial outreach included sending letters (this was the era before email) to a list of women radio producers who had attended a meeting of radio women at the 3^rd World Conference on Women in Nairobi.  Genevieve Vaughan, who convened that meeting, would become a funder and supporter of WINGS (among other feminist media projects).

It soon became obvious in many ways that public radio considered a program “only about women” too radical.  The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which had taken over from the Satellite Program Development Fund, explicitly stated “this is an idea whose time has passed.”

Fortunately, the National Federation of Community Broadcasters offered Frieda a grant to attend the 2^nd-ever conference of the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (French acronym AMARC), which took place in Vancouver, Canada – just up the road from San Francisco. Katherine and Frieda both attended and made connections with stations and producers that would endure over the decades.  After a few more years of trying to market WINGS to public radio stations, WINGS concentrated entirely on supplying programs to community radio stations around the world.

Especially while located in California, WINGS eventually received grants from several foundations.  After the earthquake of 1989, Frieda, Katherine, and WINGS re-located to Kansas City.  In 1991, Genevieve Vaughan sent Frieda and another woman to the Philippines to attend the Who Calls the Shots? Women in Media and Advertising conference.  There, Frieda met for the first time her idol Dr. Donna Allen, who was presenting about the use of Space Bridges (later known as satellite feeds – an early precursor of today’s Zoom events).

The trip to the Philippines was related to Frieda’s consultative role in the founding of a women’s shortwave program known as FIRE (Feminist International Radio Endeavour) – based in Costa Rica, where there was a shortwave station called Radio for Peace International. FIRE was eventually thrown off of that station, and the station was then thrown off of the UN property where it had been located; but FIRE continued for many years, doing many live interviews with women at international conferences, and streaming and archiving audio online, both in English and Spanish.  Maria Suarez, whom we hired to head the FIRE project, recently gave a talk about it online [link to come – her talk will be this coming Saturday].

In 1992, Katherine Davenport died of leukemia, in Kansas City. A few months later, Genevieve Vaughan invited Frieda to move back to Austin, Texas, and take up a job with the Foundation for a Compassionate Society.  Part of the job included continuing to produce WINGS, as well as participating in the design and execution of a panoply of remarkable national and international feminist events – which yielded excellent content for radio. 

A few years after that the Foundation closed, and in 2002 Frieda and her partner Suzette Cullen relocated to Canada.  Frieda worked for 12 years as Spoken World Coordinator at the campus radio station of Simon Fraser University, then retired to an island – where she still produces and distributes WINGS today, with the help of contributing producers from around the world.

After the Foundation closed, Frieda continued to follow Genevieve’s events and projects.  One of the most recent is a series of Zoom salons that can be found on the website maternalgifteconomymovement.org – some of the presentations in that series have found their way into WINGS programs, as well. 

Over the years, the distribution process for WINGS has become simpler and less costly – from mailing cassettes (later CDs) to the stations, WINGS has gone to digital distribution online, largely through the community radio networks of the US, Canada, and Australia.  WINGS is also in the process of putting our entire archive of programs online on the website archive.org.

Along with her work with WINGS Frieda has been involved in two international media organization. She eventually became the Women’s Representative from North America, and then Vice President from North America on the AMARC Board.  Donna Allen’s pal Mal Johnson persuaded Frieda to come with her to a meeting of the International Association of Women in Radio and Television in India.  Later, Frieda would become a radio juror, then a Board member, and finally President of IAWRT. In 2022, she served on the board of the US chapter, and as a member of the international elections committee. Through both the Women’s Network of AMARC and IAWRT, Frieda has been able to connect with United Nations women’s activities, and of course has met new producers for WINGS.

Despite having held various offices, Frieda considers herself more of a listener than a leader.  Listening to women and putting together radio shows of their ideas and voices and stories and theories is her primary passion.  It has been more than 36 years since the first edition of WINGS went up on the satellite.  She hopes to be able to continue the weekly show for a few more years at least, and to be sure that women’s actions get – and stay – on the record. 

To be added to the WINGS mailing list, and to find locations for their archives, email wings@wings.org.  

Ariel Dougherty will be receiving one of the 2022 Women and Media Awards from WIFP at our 50th Anniversary celebration October 23rd, coming to Washington, DC, from New Mexico. As a filmmaker, for almost five decades, Ariel Dougherty has been a leader in the independent and feminist film & cultural communities. 

Teacher, producer, and mentor, she has encouraged hundreds of women directed films to completion and to reach a wide and varied audience. Among these works are FEAR, a short by Jean Shaw produced in a community workshop setting to Lynn Hershman’s WOMEN, ART, REVOLUTION!, for which Ariel raised a single $100,000 contribution. She has written scores of articles about the intersection of women’s rights, funding, and media & cultural policy. She co-lead creation of a Women’s Media Policy in November 2011 at National Council on Women’s Organizations. 

As National Director of Media Equity Collaborative, 2007-2013, she surveyed the field of women centered media to enlarge their support before the donor community. An administrator at the East Hampton, NY public access facility Ariel created the Producer’s group, and she also anchored her own show, CUTURAL DEMOCRACY/ECOLOGY. Always an innovator and visionary, she initiated, TARTS/Teaching Artists to Reach Technological Savvy, a 1984 Apple funded network of four women’s arts organizations. Development director of Women’s Studio Workshop in Rosendale, NY, she curated the series, “Women’s Work in film & Video”. She was integral to the revolutionary project, International VIDEOLETTERS, a monthly video exchange among 26 women’s media groups from fourteen feminist communities across the US. 

In 1969 Ariel co-initiated Women Make Movies, first as a production arm of the Women’s Liberation Movement and was incorporated in 1972. A community based media teaching workshop was the heart of its original program with distribution as a critical earned income program. Today the organization is the globe’s largest distributor of women’s films and one of the most self-sustaining organizations to emerge from the women’s liberation movement. 

Currently Ariel is completing a book about 26 contemporary girl/women/lesbian community based film teaching programs, with a look back to the parallel projects from the 1970s. With Sheila Paige, her WMM co-founder, she is working to bring their early films like SWEET BANANAS, WOMEN’S HAPPY TIME COMMUNE and SURVIVA and the workshop films before new audiences today. @MediaEquity

The Women’s Institute for Freedom of the Press is honoring Birgitte Jallov with one of the 2022 Women and Media Awards. She will be present at WIFP’s 50th Anniversary celebration, October 23rd, where all the winners of the 2022 Women and Media Awards will be announced. If you are not familiar with the outstanding work of Birgitte Jallov, please read about her media contributions.

Birgitte Jallov is the founding Director of EMPOWERHOUSE, an initiative to advance communities’ access to strong, sustainable community media, which Birgitte has worked to advance since the early 80s where she was a part of the budding community radio movement in her home country of Denmark. Since them Birgitte has worked systematically with documenting how community media can advance women’s voices, rights and empowered lives in more than 70 countries worldwide, based on which she is presently preparing a podcast series about ‘Women on the Global Community Airwaves’. This series will dig into what it is that distinguishes a community radio/media environment with significant women’s engagement and one without; and it will contribute to Birgitte’s ongoing work to identify strategies of empowerment to transform communication.

Having just stepped down as the chairwoman of ‘Community media forum Europe’ where Birgitte as the editor of the CMFE newsletter still pursues the Forum’s objectives of strengthening community media in Europe, Birgitte is a significant voice, securing space for and engagement of women in the sector. A former member of the international board of the International Association of Women in Radio and TV (IAWRT) and now lead member of several of the organization’s management committees, she has facilitated the development of the organization’s first strategic plan in recent times and heads the ‘Rural Women and the Media’ and the ‘Moldova Digital Safe House Committee’ – a one-stop-shop for women in the media, targeted by online – and off-line – harassment. 

Birgitte is the author of ‘EMPOWERMENT RADIO – voices building the community’ on how to build sustainable community radio, where the successor is on its way, focusing on community media’s role in advancing the many important aspects of human rights. An author of numerous policy publications, community media manuals, and articles on how to ensure community ownership of the media, Birgitte lectures in universities and trains community-based organizations. In her quest to ensure women’s space in the media – not least community media, she has initiated and designed impact assessment methodologies, in order to extract ways to secure empowered lives of women in and around the (community) media.

WIFP supports the Nuclear Ban Treaty.

Nuclear weapons are an existential threat to sentient life on our planet. Urge President Biden to sign the U.S. onto the treaty. We call on all world leaders to eliminate nuclear weapons. Do not modernize, eliminate!

Press Conference, June 22. The event was livestreamed and broadcast to Vienna, where the State Parties to the Treaty are meeting for the first time.

Promote the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in the U.S.

Support the Norton Bill H.R.2850.

Already signed the ICAN (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons) Pledge AND co-sponsored the Norton Bill:

Eleanor Holmes Norton (DC)
Jim McGovern (MA-2)
Barbara Lee (CA-13)
Carolyn Maloney (NY-12)
Pramila Jayapal (WA-7)
Mark Pocan (WI-2)
Rashida Tlaib (MI-13)
Ilhan Omar (MN-5)

Signed the ICAN (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons) Pledge but still needs to co-sponsor the Norton bill:

Earl Blumenauer (OR-3)
Ro Khanna (CA-17)
Betty McCollum (MN-4)

Co-sponsored the Norton bill but still needs to sign the ICAN Pledge:

Ayanna Pressley (MA-7)
Peter Welch (VT)
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14)
Andy Levin (MI-9)
Mondaire Jones (NY-17)
Raúl Grijalva (AZ-3, Tucson)

NUCLEARBAN.US

WIFP and DC Action For Assange reject today’s announced decision of the UK Home Secretary, Priti Patel, to extradite Mr. Julian Assange to the United States, the country that plotted to assassinate him.  Mr. Assange is a journalist and publisher, who told the truth about US crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.  The US Government now seeks to extradite Assange to the US, with a range of charges that could bring up to 175 years in prison.  Assange’s extradition was initially blocked by UK courts, on the grounds that a US prison sentence would constitute “cruel and unusual punishment”; however, subsequent appeals have cleared the way for extradition.  (More details at www.assangedefense.org)  

Tens of thousands of people signed petitions, and dozens of journalism and civil liberties organizations wrote to Patel, asking her to stop this extradition of an innocent journalist. They expressed concern for his human rights and the worldwide chilling effect on media freedom caused by this indictment.

On May 10, 2022, Council of Europe Human Rights Commissioner Dunja Mijatovic called on Priti Patel not to extradite Julian Assange:

He wrote: […] it is my view that the indictment by the United States against Mr Assange raises important questions about the protection of those that publish classified information in the public interest, including information that exposes human rights violations. The broad and vague nature of the allegations against Mr Assange, and of the offenses listed in the indictment, are troubling as many of them concern activities at the core of investigative journalism in Europe and beyond.Consequently, allowing Mr Assange’s extradition on this basis would have a chilling effect on media freedom, and could ultimately hamper the press in performing its task as purveyor of information and public watchdog in democratic societies.

Among other statements of support, a group of more than 300 doctors from around the world, known as Doctors for Assange, called on the UK to block extradition. In a letter to Patel, the group says the WikiLeaks founder suffered a mini stroke last October and that his overall health is continuing to deteriorate in prison. The doctors write, “The extradition of a person with such compromised health … is medically and ethically unacceptable.”  

Other statements supporting Assange have come from Nobel Peace Prize winners, celebrities such as musician Roger Waters and actress Susan Sarandon, and many others.

Priti Patel’s decision to extradite Mr. Assange has shown a total disregard of the human rights watch groups and experts who warned her that his extradition to the USA would be illegal under international human rights law and create a severe threat to media freedom. 

What does it tell us when the United Nations, press freedom, and civil liberties organizations are ignored by powerful governments? It shows us that these supposedly democratic governments have much to hide, that investigative journalism is vitally needed more than ever, and that the gathering of “buried” truth is the only tool we have to defend against corruption and totalitarian rule.

We, along with hundreds of thousands of people around the world, will continue to protest and demand justice and freedom for Julian Assange.  Members of DC Action for Assange will continue to rally at the US Department of Justice and in bi-weekly vigils calling on Attorney General Merrick Garland to drop the charges (the next vigil will be Sunday, June 19, 2022 from 5-7 pm, near the Bethesda, MD home of AG Garland).

DC Action for Assange