About Ananke | Realizing an Inclusive Future
Founded in 2014, Ananke is a global digital media, publishing, and development platform dedicated to fostering inclusive conversations through a gender lens. Grounded in an ethos of ethical storytelling and feminist mentorship, the platform aims to democratize the media landscape by documenting women’s achievements and showcasing them as role models. By prioritizing representation and diversity, Ananke advocates for a democratic discourse where freedom of expression and transparency are central to media development.
The platform provides a comprehensive look at global issues, offering in-depth articles and interviews on topics such as health inequalities, climate justice, technology, and gender-based violence. Beyond its website and YouTube channel, Ananke publishes special digital editions on the ISSUU platform to mark significant occasions like International Women’s Day and the Day of the Girl, focusing on themes like Women’s Economic Empowerment and cultural progress.
Capacity Building & Global Impact
Central to Ananke’s mission is its flagship program, Empower, a digital internship and capacity-building initiative launched in 2016. The program has mentored over 75 girls from a diverse array of countries—including Kenya, Pakistan, Nigeria, China, and the UAE—equipping them with the skills to lead in the digital realm. This commitment to inclusion earned Ananke two nominations for the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) Prizes in 2019 and 2020.
Innovation & Community Engagement
Through Ananke Labs, the organization hosts a variety of online and offline events, including IBMZ bootcamps and ICT workshops. A major milestone was the Ananke Girl Summit in 2020, which was the first digital event for the MENA and Subcontinent regions focused specifically on the girl child. The summit featured 30 breakout sessions and a speaker lineup that was 99 percent female, reaching hundreds of attendees via the HOPIN platform.
Most recently, Ananke has expanded its ecosystem with the launch of the Ananke Women in Literature Foundation. This collective further reinforces the platform’s dedication to feminist storytelling that challenges, uplifts, and transforms the global narrative.
Vision | Celebrating Visionary Women by Creating HERstories
Ananke’s aim is to encourage women’s economic empowerment by raising awareness about the importance of equal participation in the technology revolution. The platform also strives to trigger as well as engage in conversations focusing inclusion and gender in every sphere of society in digital space. Most importantly, Ananke offers a wide array of capacity building and leadership programs with a vision to create a talent-pool of female trailblazers.
Ananke’s Flagship Program
Ananke’s digital internship is a program offering training and mentorship to aspiring women and girls from all over the world. Offering access to safe digital space, the initiative enables interns to work in a virtual environment and offers online workshops in the fields of communication, ICTs & new technologies, advocacy and digital journalism.
Ananke’s digital internship program started with one participant from Morocco in 2016 and has so far mentored and trained over 40 girls from Kenya, Nigeria, Pakistan, India, UAE, US, Morocco, Australia and many more. For our 2019 cohort, we received more than 100 applications in just 20 days from all over the world. The final cohort comprised of 18 girls from China, Belarus, Tanzania, Kenya, Pakistan, China, Egypt, Belarus, Nigeria, Russia, Denmark, and Bangladesh. Ananke’s digital internship program not only aims at leveraging tech to empower women by offering access, meaningful engagement and safe online space; our program is a celebration of inclusive diversity in the digital realm as it works with an intersectional approach.
Following their journey, our girls have gone on to be selected as UN Women’s Empower Women Champions For Change, TechWomen and an MIT Solver etc.
Key Focus Areas
The platform focuses on four main areas with a vision to transform aspiring women and girls into changemakers and future leaders, participating in modern, knowledge-based society.
Access: The platform offers a digital space where girls engage in meaningful dialogue on issues with a gender lens and learn the importance of diversity and inclusion. Participating interns work in real-world scenarios in real-time.
Research: Ananke’s interns have access to our large database of in-depth stories, articles, research work and interviews on gender, the SDGs, leveraging tech for good & more, developed and produced by field experts.
Skills: Selected participants work in a diversified virtual environment and are assigned team- or individual-based projects pertaining to digital media, women’s issues, gender equality, journalism, ICTs and much more. Mentorship is another key part of our program and are connected with mentors through Ananke’s partnerships with organizations like WomeninTechPk (a community of 7000+ tech leaders), Women’s Digital League, Circle Women and Women Engineers Pakistan. They also get an opportunity to watch female leaders talk about their journey through our VIMEO Channel Power Talk.
Leadership: Through Ananke’s program, women and girls are given an opportunity to hone their skills through critical thinking, use of digital technologies, 21st century skills, capacity and confidence building, peer mentoring, working as teams and much more. A diverse environment helps them gain confidence and acquire a very broad vision.
Ananke’s Media Kit 2021
