Thanks for writing this great piece, and I am in agreement. As far as Sidetracked goes, it's fair to say that we can always do better – and I think it's also fair to say that we probably put more emphasis on representation in writers than photographers. If you look at the writing credits, there are far more women far more visible in every issue, even if we're not always dead on a 50/50 split. I agree that representation behind the lens is far more challenging and you are right to raise this issue.
Every single day we are trying to do our best to break the image of adventure being an exclusively white male space. IMHO we were striving towards this ideal years before our competitors, and all of us on the editorial team are thinking about this with every issue we make. It's important to us that we have talented and experienced women on our team – I'd like to especially point out Jenny Tough, Emily Woodhouse, and Harriet Osborne, all of whom are absolutely crucial to what we do.
We work extremely hard with a small team and very limited resources to do the best we can, and have proudly published the work of many fantastic women recently. I'm currently in talks with several more for inclusion in the next two issues. One problem is that it's staggeringly hard to fill three issues a year with the level of quality that we aspire to publish as it is, even from the pool of (overwhelmingly white male) submissions that we receive, because the truth is that most of the submissions in our inboxes are low quality. I spend a lot of time seeking out talented female writers and photographers because (with a few exceptions) they just aren't pitching us with the kind of work we publish. Send us the pitches and we'll listen to you! The reality for a small business in a staggeringly difficult market is that we can only do our best.
Overall, I don't see this as purely an issue of representation – I see it as about telling good stories that people want to read, because the white male brave explorer trope is so very overdone at this point.
Thanks for writing this great piece, and I am in agreement. As far as Sidetracked goes, it's fair to say that we can always do better – and I think it's also fair to say that we probably put more emphasis on representation in writers than photographers. If you look at the writing credits, there are far more women far more visible in every issue, even if we're not always dead on a 50/50 split. I agree that representation behind the lens is far more challenging and you are right to raise this issue.
Every single day we are trying to do our best to break the image of adventure being an exclusively white male space. IMHO we were striving towards this ideal years before our competitors, and all of us on the editorial team are thinking about this with every issue we make. It's important to us that we have talented and experienced women on our team – I'd like to especially point out Jenny Tough, Emily Woodhouse, and Harriet Osborne, all of whom are absolutely crucial to what we do.
We work extremely hard with a small team and very limited resources to do the best we can, and have proudly published the work of many fantastic women recently. I'm currently in talks with several more for inclusion in the next two issues. One problem is that it's staggeringly hard to fill three issues a year with the level of quality that we aspire to publish as it is, even from the pool of (overwhelmingly white male) submissions that we receive, because the truth is that most of the submissions in our inboxes are low quality. I spend a lot of time seeking out talented female writers and photographers because (with a few exceptions) they just aren't pitching us with the kind of work we publish. Send us the pitches and we'll listen to you! The reality for a small business in a staggeringly difficult market is that we can only do our best.
Overall, I don't see this as purely an issue of representation – I see it as about telling good stories that people want to read, because the white male brave explorer trope is so very overdone at this point.
(My comment copied over from Instagram)
Thanks for putting the work into this article! I’m learning a lot!
Thanks for your open ears Brett! Appreciate it.