I am a writer, speaker and movement builder with fifteen years’ experience in storytelling for social change and a passion for lived experience leadership development.
As an author I’m represented by the fantastic folks at OWN IT! literary agency and am currently working on my first book, The State of Britain is Killing Us (Trapeze.) This work of narrative nonfiction collects the stories of lives lost at the hands of the state, told by the loved ones left behind to fight for justice and change. As a journalist I have written on social policy and justice issues for the Guardian, the Independent, the i, al Jazeera, Red Pepper, Wellcome Collection, Hunger Magazine, Huffington Post, New Internationalist and others.
Over fifteen years in communications & campaigns I have been honoured to work with survivors, migrant workers, refugees & human rights defenders from across the UK and the Global South, supporting them to tell their stories and campaign against injustice, working for with organisations including War on Want, Right to Remain, Rape Crisis, INQUEST and the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB), where I led the Media & Communications Team until 2023.
After the death of my cousin Gaia Pope, a survivor of child sexual exploitation who was badly failed by police and NHS, I led the grassroots Justice for Gaia campaign for five years. After historic inquest into Gaia’s death unearthed more than 50 failings Gaia’s care & the search for her, I worked with civil society partners to release the Justice For Gaia manifesto for the prevention of future deaths and now continue this work through the Gemini Project.
I hold two degrees from the University of London, a 1:1 Creative Writing MA from Birkbeck College and 1:1 Politics & Development Studies BA from my time at SOAS where I studied during the peak of the student movement.
My name is Danish and pronounced My-enna so I’m known as Mya for short. People do sometimes get confused and think I’m either two completely different people (untrue) or one person with a secretive alter-ego (if true, incidental.)
To find out more about my work, explore the website or head over to my linktree.
You can find me on Instagram and sporadically on twitter @MariennaPW but if you’d like to get in touch do drop me an email via the website as I am rarely up to date with my DMs!
MARIENNA POPE-WEIDEMANN 