Apply: Colorado River Writing Fellowship for Indigenous Women

Colorado River in Moab, UT. © Backroad Packers/Unsplash.

Planet Women is a start-up environmental nonprofit that partners with women to create a healthy planet for all life. Through grants and leadership programs, we resource women and organizations that protect forest, water and biodiversity health, and improve gender equity. Since our founding in 2020, Planet Women has invested more than $4.4 million in holistic support for women environmental leaders and field projects in the Amazon, Africa, and the American West.

Within the American West, Planet Women has a special focus on the Colorado River Basin. The monumental lifeline that is the Colorado River has carved canyons and sustained cultures and wildlife for millions of years—yet now it’s drying up. The Colorado River runs from the Rocky Mountains through seven U.S. states and into Mexico where it has historically flowed into the Gulf of California. Today, the river rarely makes it that far. Demand for water exceeds the river’s capacity and the past 20 years of megadrought have further imperiled the system. Researchers estimate that Arizona, California, and Nevada will have to cut their use of Colorado River water by 40% over the next 30 years due to climate-driven drought.

To save this important river and the 40 million people that depend on it, a holistic approach and more diverse voices are needed. Recently, Planet Women co-founder and CEO Kristine Zeigler published a blog post with four things you can do to care for the Colorado River at this critical time—including this one:

#2: Communicate the impacts you are witnessing from weather events, a changing climate and aridification.

Use your preferred outlets to share your observations in blogs, videos, music, dance, visual arts, nonfiction and fiction, photography – get creative! Share the joy and challenges you find in the Basin and in places that benefit from the water that is transferred across hundreds of miles.

Creativity is a powerful tool for environmental justice. To promote creative storytelling as a way of creating a healthy future for the Basin, Planet Women and New Nature Writers are launching a new program: Journey to Publication Writing Fellowship for Indigenous Women of the Colorado River Basin. The application period has been extended to July 31, 2024.

To view (and share) Planet Women’s press release about the Fellowship, click here.

Fellowship Objectives and Selection Process

The goal of the Fellowship is to empower Indigenous women writers with a passion for the cultural, ecological, and natural narratives of the Colorado River Basin, while also capturing Indigenous women's stories. Important note: Our use of “women” includes cisgender women, femme/feminine-identifying, Two Spirit, trans, genderqueer, and non-binary individuals who have historically been excluded from the environmental space.

All applications must be submitted by July 31, 2024. Up to four Fellows will be selected, each receiving a stipend of $3,000. The Fellowship is a six-month program open to all Indigenous women ages 18 and older who write fiction and non-fiction, and who live in or work on environmental and social justice issues related to the Colorado River Basin. Fellows will be selected based on the potential of their submitted writing samples and the strength of their ideas related to Indigenous women's experiences in the Basin.

Fellowship Details

During the Fellowship, we will guide writers from the conceptualization stage to publication, fostering collaboration between Fellows and mentors. By the program's conclusion, Fellows will have developed a manuscript, devised a publishing plan, and crafted a marketing strategy to effectively pitch their work to agents and publishers. We are partnering with highly experienced writer and writing coach Laurie Scheer from New Nature Writers to facilitate the Fellowship.

The Fellowship aims to address a range of environmental and social justice issues relevant to the Basin, including access to clean water, sanitation, climate change, pollution, river restoration, agriculture, tribal water rights, cultural practices, nature writing, Indigenous wisdom, conflicts with extractive industries, colonization, and contemporary experiences. All individuals, regardless of age or background, are encouraged to apply, as inclusivity and diversity are central to the Fellowship's mission.

Timeline: The application period closes on July 31, 2024 and the 2024 Fellows will be announced in early-to-mid August. The Fellowship itself runs from approximately August 2024 - Spring 2025.

Click below for all the details and application link!