Gal-Dem Is The New Magazine By Women Of Colour

Gal-Dem is the phrase chosen to describe girlhood and female friendship, being the title of the new magazine created and written by women of colour in the UK, making its print debut. While 14 per cent of the UK are ethnic minorities, only six percent of people working in newspapers, radio and television are part of this minority.

Liv Little is 22 and lives in South London and met Leyla Reynolds in a ‘politics’ course at the University of Bristol. Little is the editor-in-chief, while Reynolds is the culture editor. So far they have gathered stories from over 60 contributors from all over the world to tell narratives different from the mainstream.

The magazine is split into seven sections which are: sisterhood, the body, sex & growth, music, arts and culture and comment. The first print issue will centre around the theme of ‘gal-hood’. Although the magazine is created and written by women of colour it is of course made to be written by people of all races and genders.

The editors of the magazine were motivated by their own experiences of the media growing up. Leyla Reynolds describes wanting to straighten her hair as a child, she reflects that maybe this desire came from only seeing one kind of woman in the media.

“As I got older I did start to question why it was the case that there was only one kind of woman represented in the media — how damaging and limiting it is, in particular for young girls whose insecurities are immediately pounced upon as they hit puberty as a target for product marketing” said Leyla Reynolds.

Similarly, Liv Little describes that it isn’t so much what is said that is racist about the representation of racial minorities in the media, but it is about what is excluded.

“The experiences of women of color in feminism were rarely talked about; everything was skimmed over and I was getting pretty pissed off with the structure of things… It wasn’t so much that I had read a lot of damning things, it was more a lack of inclusion which acted as a catalyst for launching gal-dem” said Liv Little.

This new magazine, Gal-Dem, is exciting, accessible and hopefully the beginning of a more inclusive racial representation of minorities both visually in magazines and behind the scenes.