Georgetown Law Center
The Georgetown Law Center on Poverty and Inequality works with policymakers, researchers, practitioners and advocates to develop effective policies and practices that alleviate poverty and inequality in the United States.
The Project
Adultification Bias Video
The Challenge
Develop video content to raise awareness and highlight the effects of adultification, which is the perception of black girls as less innocent and more adult-like than white girls of the same age.
The Solution
Use storytelling to elevate the voices of Black women and girls and share their lived experience. By combining direct quotes from focus groups with quantitative statistics called out in the client’s accompanying reports, we were able to establish a powerful narrative that is authentic, respectful and impactful. It was our goal to humanize the issue, spark new conversations and reflect a reality that is far too often ignored and normalized. The graphic novel approach of the creative direction was used to reflect the stark realities of adultification bias and bring light to a deep societal issue that has been lost in the shadows for too long. Through engaging animation, an authentic voice, and conscious character development, we worked to distill a complex narrative into a powerful piece of shareable content to promote awareness and drive change.
Awards
AdFed The Show – Best in Show – Best of Public Service
3+ Years Post-Launch Results
- 215,000+YouTube views
- 61,000+ Twitter views
- 11,000+Facebook views
The video was picked up and featured by popular news publications including Vice, Vox and HuffPost and inspired others, including Viola Davis -actor and activist, to share their own stories of adultification bias.
“The development and production of this project was an intense yet rewarding process to witness. We had to maintain the integrity of the stories and their life experiences of these young girls and women. Recreating someone’s personal story in a compelling and truthful way is always a challenge. These stories made me realize this does happen everyday and it continues to happen. We had to really analyze and hone in on what stories and visuals we wanted to show.”
Derek Skar, Illustrator
“The most challenging part of this process was figuring out how to discuss an issue that felt very familiar and personal to me. There was a kind of pressure that came with that to create something that did justice to the issue of adultification and how it can feel to have that imposed on you. I wanted our audience to empathize with the stories we were helping to share. But overall, I think that pressure and those challenges gave rise to a really solid final product that our whole team is proud of.”
Noah Lawrence-Holder, Animator
“I can relate to this project in many ways and working on it has been therapeutic for me. Knowing that there’s a group of people willing to be a voice and speak out on Audultification Bias has been a warming feeling and gives me hope for the future generations to come.”
Tikisha Torrence, Voice Actress
Next Project:
Sephora Racial Bias in Retail Video