Her Story Arc is dedicated to finding and praising honest and progressive stories of women and girls in the media. We want to build a site where anyone who identifies as a woman can find a safe space to celebrate the steps our society is taking in the right direction. Feminists of all kinds–LGBTQ, POC, environmentalists, differently abled, from any economic/religious background–are welcome here.Recently, I was fortunate to strike up a conversation with Lindsey Loree, the founder and editor of Her Story Arc. She's a remarkable woman, who shares many of my own passions. So when she agreed to do an interview, I jumped at the chance to share her story and the amazing work she's doing. If you're not already following Her Story Arc, you really should be!
SRPS: First off all, can you tell me a little about yourself? What are you working on? What are your goals? What inspires you?
LL: I'm a woman with many interests. In addition to running HerStoryArc.com I founded and chaired the Twin Cities Chapter of Geek Girl Brunch, and I am currently working on my MBA with an end goal of becoming a Certified Public Accountant. My future aspirations include starting my own business, running for public office, and publishing a book series I've been working on since I was 13. Sometimes life doesn't seem long enough to accomplish everything!
I am ambitious and find inspiration in other ambitious women. I can easily look back over my life and find my idols: Xena Warrior Princess, the Pink Ranger, Lessa from Dragonrider's of Pern, Rachel from Animorphs, and many others. I owe a debt to the men and women who created and breathed life into those characters, and it's a debt I take seriously. I want to help break all the ceilings and make it that much easier for the girls and women following behind me to achieve greatness.
SRPS: What is Her Story Arc?
LL: Her Story Arc is dedicated to finding and praising honest and progressive stories of women and girls in the media. It is a site where anyone who identifies as a girl or woman can find a safe space to celebrate the steps our society is taking in the right direction. We continually strive toward intersectionality within this mission.
At Her Story Arc you will not find posts on the latest terrible things being portrayed in the media regarding women. We are dedicated to finding the good in the world. We want to make you aware of who is doing it right. Let’s praise the creators, writers, actors, musicians, politicians, and everyday people making progress!
SRPS: What inspired you to create HSA?
LL: Her Story Arc started out as a personal blog I called (rather boringly) "Sense and Responsibility". It didn't take long for me to feel dissatisfied with personal blogging. I'm generally a private person and I didn't know what to say. Then a seed of an idea planted into my brain after observing the #NotBuyingIt campaign started by The Representation Project (formerly called Miss Representation). I saw the merits of boycotting and shaming companies into changing their ways, but I felt there needed to be more balance. We need a carrot and a stick. HerStoryArc.com is our carrot. While we are still small, we do our darnedest to help promote the creators and businesses we think are making a positive impact.
I came up with the name "Her Story Arc" while in a Marketing class I took toward fulfilling requirements to get my MBA. We had discussed branding and how important a good name is for an organization, so I made a long list of all the words I felt embodied my vision for the website I had in mind. I tried different combinations, and when I put together "her" and "story arc" I knew I had nailed it.
SRPS: What are your goals for HSA?
LL: My 5 year goal is to recruit enough writers that our collective experience and uniqueness will give HerStoryArc.com a wide lense through which readers can understand all aspects of feminism. My long long term goal is to hear cultural commentators on TV and elsewhere say "It looks like HerStoryArc is staying silent on this [insert medium], most likely due to...". It would be amazing if people turned to us to see if a movie/show/comic/etc. was good enough to get a review.
If this sounds exciting to you, consider volunteering your time and contributing to HerStoryArc! It's as easy as contacting me at editor@herstoryarc.com.
SRPS: Putting together a blog is a lot of work. What keeps you motivated?
LL: I consider HerStoryArc a responsibility that needs to be fulfilled. I don't always feel inspired or excited about maintaining and administering the site, but I feel compelled to keep it going. It's our collective contribution toward figuring out the society that we want to live in versus the society that we currently have. I strongly feel that we need to show people how much better things can be when we are inclusive, and give examples of what success looks like. If we talk about feminism without any concrete examples of what a feminist society looks like, or what feminist people/characters look like, we are confusing the issue for the uninitiated. They will fall back on what our mass culture has defined as feminism, and that definition is rife with decades of misinformation and slandering propaganda.
SRPS: Where can people find HSA online?
LL: You can connect to Her Story Arc on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and of course by going directly to HerStoryArc.com
If you like the work I do here on SRPS, please support me!
0 comments :
Post a Comment