Grants:Project/Rapid/Imago Theatre/Canadian theatre edit-a-thon

statusNot Funded

Imago Theatre/Canadian theatre edit-a-thon

Imago Theatre, in association with Festival Jamais Lu is holding an all-day gathering of English and French theatre artists in Montreal to create, edit and translate Wikipedia pages for female/female-identifying and non-binary Canadian theatre artists. Training will be provided.

targetEnglish, French.

start dateMay 11

end dateMay 11

budget (local currency)1000

budget (USD)751.83, requested by an organization

grant typeAn organization, we are a theatre company and a registered non-profit organization.

non-profit statusyes

grantee• Imago Theatre

contact(s)• sophie

imagotheatre.ca• www.imagotheatre.ca

organization (if applicable)• Imago Theatre micheline@imagotheatre.ca

website (if applicable)• www.imagotheatre.ca

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Create your report

Please see the sample Editathon/Training application before drafting your application.

Project Goal

Choose one or more of the following goals. You can add or delete goals as needed.

Add or improve content for Canadian female/female-identifying/non-binary theatre artists in both English and French Wikipedia pages
Recruit new editors
Increase skills for existing editors

Project Plan

Activities

Tell us how you'll carry out your project. Be sure to answer the following questions:

1. Are you doing one editathon or training or a series of editathons or trainings?

At the moment, we are planning one editathon. If attendance is good and the event is effective in terms of number of Wikipedia articles created/updated/translated, we are looking to scale up the event nationally with partner companies across Canada in 2020.

2. How will you let your community know about the event? Please paste links below to where relevant communities have been notified of your proposal, and to any other relevant community discussions.

Imago Theatre is partnering with Festival Jamais Lu to present the editathon. The Festival is in its 17th edition and has a strong following, particularly within the Francophone theatre community. This year, the festival is focussing on pan-Canadian dramaturgy and the editathon is very much in line with this year's theme. The festival will be welcoming Imago Theatre to present the editathon as part of the festival's activities and the event will benefit from being added to the list of events in the festival press communication and social media.

Imago has been reaching out to professional theatre companies individually, asking each to nominate a short list of theatre artists associated with each company to be added, and to give us biographical and professional information, high-resolution archive photographs and media, links to work and links to reviews for productions for each artist. A partner francophone company will also reach out to the francophone community with the same request, so that editathon participants will have all archive material available to them on the day of the editathon.

We will also be canvassing our social media network for suggestions of female theatre artists who need a Wikipedia page/whose page needs adding to/whose page should be translated from English to French or vice versa. We are asking each of the collaborating companies to ask the same to their networks. Imago will Facebook live the training and provide online support through our facebook page for participants who cannot join us.

Imago Theatre will also be making a blog series on the run up to the event, highlighting a few Canadian theatre artists who we feel should be added to Wikipedia, and promoting the event through our social media networks.

3. Do you have experienced Wikimedia editors to lead the event?

Imago Theatre Associate Artist Sophie Gee will be leading the event. Sophie is completely new to Wikipedia editing however she will undergo the online training available through the Art+Feminism website. Imago team members Erin Lindsay and Danna-Rae Evasiuk, both of whom will undergo online training, will also be on hand to answer questions from the participants. Imago has also been in contact with Amber Berson at Art+Feminism for valuable help and advice. Imago is currently looking for a colleague from a French theatre company to also train to be a trainer to provide training and support in French. It is also possible that Imago will hire Amber Berson as a trainer for the event, though this is to be confirmed.

4. Do participants have the equipment or skills needed to participate and contribute high quality content? If not, how will you support them?

Participants will bring their own laptop and the cafe at Théâtre Aux Écuries has wifi. There will be training provided both in English and French (set up with a laptop and projector) and trainers will be on hand throughout the day to help with any questions. The partner theatre companies will already have supplied us with a list of names with biographical/professional details on each theatre artist, links to articles/reviews online as well as high resolution images from productions, so the content will be high quality. We can upload all the archive material to a shared Google drive so that participants have ready access to them during the event.

5. How will you engage participants after the event(s)?

We will let the participants know after the editathon the statistics of the event (numbers of articles created, edited, and translated along with the names of the artists). We will also encourage participants to use their new skills to continue to update Wikipedia, including a list of the female artists who did not get added during the event. If this first event goes well, we are looking to expand it nationally next year, so we will definitely be keeping in touch with all the participants with updates on the project.

6. Is there anything else you want to tell us about this project?

This event will take place three weeks after the "Chantier Féministe", a week-long event organized by Espace GO to bring together women theatre artists in Montreal working in both French and English. The editathon is a concrete action that members of our community will be able to take to increase the exposure of Canadian theatre women artists online and also an opportunity to continue building relationships forged during the Chantier Féministe. The editathon will also take place a week after a three-day conference on Pan-Canadian dramaturgy at the Festival Jamais Lu, so again it is a concrete action that the English and French theatre communities can undertake to improve exposure for female/female-identifying/non-binary artists together. It will also be a rare collaboration of the English and French theatre community. The translation opportunity afforded by bringing together the two communities is also advantageous, increasing the profile of female theatre artists who are often restricted to exposure in one language or another due to the language barrier. Being an art form that is heavily dependent on language, there is a strong linguistic divide in our two theatre communities and the editathon is a way to actively both support women artists and bring our communities together.

Impact

How will you know if the project is successful and you've met your goals? Please include the following targets:

Number of events One for this year. If successful, we want to scale this up in 2020 to have events across Canada with partner theatre companies.
Number of participants 30-40
Number of new editors 30-40
Number of of articles created or improved 100
Number of repeat participants (for projects that include a series of events) n/a

Resources

What resources do you have? Include information on who is organizing the project, what they will do, and if you will receive support from anywhere else (in-kind donations or additional funding).

Imago Theatre is the lead on the project and providing organization, promotion and publicity. We have received the donation of a free space from Théâtre Aux Écuries, and free access to one of their rehearsal rooms in the same building for childcare. Playwrights Guild of Canada is supporting this event through promotion of the event to their members and supplying us with a list of their full members, highlighting those they feel should have a presence on Wikipedia. We have invited all of the English theatre companies who are members of Montreal chapter of the Professional Association of Canadian Theatre to nominate artists to add, and to give us archive material on the artists they name. Some theatre companies have already confirmed that they will send archive material and representatives to the event. We are partnering with Festival Jamais Lu on this event, and are in talks with Espace Go about their involvement.

What resources do you need? For your funding request, list bullet points for each expense and include a total amount.

Childcare x2 child care workers from The Lion & The Mouse @ $50/h per childcare worker x 3 hours = $300

Theatre workshops for children (bilingual childcare activity), $100/h x three different workshops of 1 hour each =$300

Snacks and refreshments $400

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