Happy Nowruz! As spring approaches, we here at Ajam Media Collective are asking for your support to keep us going for many new years to come!
We’ve started a Patreon to encourage our followers to contribute to us monthly. We’d love to be able to count on your support!
If you’ve enjoyed reading our articles, listening to our podcasts, exploring our archive, wandering our urban maps, and exploring our site, we invite you to help keep us going and able to pay our writers!
Ready to help us out? Head straight over to our Patreon!
Here’s some background on Ajam and our work to help you better understand our mission. Learn about the history of Ajam, how we function, and what we need to keep producing the content we think the Persianate world needs:
Catch us up–where did Ajam come from?
Ajam Media Collective was launched in 2011 by a group of graduate students who wanted to challenge simplistic representations of the region in the Western media and bring the complex debates happening in academia to a wider audience.
Over the last ten years, we’ve evolved into one of the most long-lasting and active platforms focused on West, Central, and South Asia – a space we define broadly as Ajamistan.
Our mission has evolved over the last decade, and has grown to include podcasts, creative writing, music, urban mapping, archives, workshops at art biennales, and partnerships for live events.
Over the years we’ve reached millions of people with content that breaks stereotypes and changes how we think about the region and the world.
Our authors have covered a wide variety of topics ranging from Zoroastrian New Year celebrations in Tehran, fashion politics in Tajikistan, Islamic and Mongol cultural exchange, carpet-weaver’s lullabies in Kashan, the Assyrian-Palestinian singer who captured the Arab World’s heart, Afghan cinematic history, the musical rhythms that connect Armenians and Azerbaijanis, Shi’i rituals in the royal court of Pahlavi Iran, how Aladdin came to be a crucial part of the 1001 Nights, the evolution of Pashtun identity under British colonialism, why Afghan miniskirts became a US obsession, the history of a joint synagogue and Muslim shrine in Iraq, lost urban histories in Yerevan, performance art in Iran’s 2022 Women, Life, Freedom protests, Iraq’s most beloved Armenian singer, the evolution of transnational Kurdish electro-dance music, and visions of borderless Persianate futurism.
How have you been paying for all this?
Ajam Media Collective is and always has been a volunteer-run initiative. It is a labor of love for all the editors involved, a group made up of academics, grad students, professionals, and researchers.
In 2018 we launched a Kickstarter in order to start paying writers, contributors, and fund special projects. Since then, we’ve used that money to make sure that writers are paid and that new projects – like the archives, the podcast, and the Mehelle urban mapping resource – can continue and thrive.
The money our supporters contributed back in 2018 has allowed us to continue for half a decade–we keep expenses low and focus on getting our articles and media out into the world. We editors continue to do this work as volunteers.
Why are you asking for money now?
We are looking to the Ajamily (Ajam family!) for a steady stream of financial support in order to keep the website alive.
We want to continue to bring you the Persianate content that has furthered the conversation about the region in important and positive directions.
Our goal is to continue supporting writers, content creators, and new projects that can expand how we think about the region and the world.
Why Patreon? Why not just take one-off donations?
As a publication, Ajam believes in offering regular, consistent content. We’ve been going strong since 2011 and we plan to keep it that way for many years to come. That’s why we invite you to support us with regular donations.
To help us plan out that work, and make sure we can continue to pay for articles, our website, and podcasts, we need to know how much money will be available to us.
Patreon allows you to contribute monthly in small increments, helping us further our mission without draining your bank account.
Take a look around our site and if you like what we do and think our work deserves to be supported, sign up!
