At Woven Agenda, we believe leadership grows from lived experience, especially the experiences that are too often silenced or ignored.
Feminist leadership is not about speaking over others. It is about making space, space for stories that have not been told, for truths that are uncomfortable, and for people who have been pushed to the margins.
That is why we have committed ourselves not just to running programs, but to listening deeply and documenting boldly. Through feminist participatory research supported by the Feminist Centre for Racial Justice and Just Associates, and now through our first LBQ documentary, we are working to ensure that those most excluded, lesbian, bisexual, and queer women, can speak for themselves, in their own words, on their own terms.
What Is Feminist Participatory Research?
For us, research is not about extracting information. It is about asking questions together, sharing power, and making sure that the people most affected by the issues are the ones shaping the knowledge.
Our feminist participatory approach means:
- LBQ women are co-researchers, not just subjects.
- The questions we ask are shaped by lived reality, not external assumptions.
- The findings are used to build voice, power, and protection.
- We share results back with the community first, before anyone else.
This way of working is slow. It is not always neat. But it is honest, and it is deeply respectful of the women at its core.
The Power of Telling Our Own Stories
This year, we began filming our first LBQ documentary in Malawi. It centers on the everyday lives of women who have long been erased, by silence, by law, by fear. These are stories of strength, love, survival, and resistance.
For many of the women involved, it was the first time they had been asked to tell their stories in full. Not just about hardship, but about joy, friendship, creativity, and identity. We filmed with care, guided by the women themselves, making sure they felt safe, respected, and in control of how their stories were shared.
This documentary is a record of what it means to exist, to resist, and to belong, even when the world tells you not to.
Why This Matters
In Malawi, LBQ women are often left out of conversations about gender, rights, and inclusion. They face violence at home, discrimination in healthcare and jobs, and a deep, isolating invisibility in public life.
Feminist leadership means centering these voices, not just as a gesture, but as a way to shift how we work, what we value, and whose lives we prioritize.
Through our research and storytelling, we are not giving voice to the voiceless, we are amplifying voices that were always there but ignored.
What’s Next
We are working to share the documentary widely and safely, starting with community screenings and closed conversations that prioritize the safety and dignity of everyone involved. We are also building a toolkit that other organizations can use to apply feminist participatory methods in their own work, especially when engaging with women in hard-to-reach or high-risk contexts.
This is only the beginning. But it’s a clear step toward a future where all women, no matter their identity or background, are heard, respected, and trusted to lead.
📣 If you’re working in research, storytelling, or LBQ community support, and you want to learn with us or partner in this work, we’d love to connect.