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This month Amiqus’ Business Manager Liz Prince speaks to BiG Chair Kish Hirani about the organisation’s new BiG REDI Calendar, mentoring and more…
FIRSTLY, WHAT WAS THE REASON BEHIND THE REBRAND OF BAME IN GAMES TO BIG?
BAME in Games was simply chosen as BAME rhymes with GAME and was an acronym (Black, Asian, Minority Ethnic) used by official government bodies to address ethnic minorities. Over the years we found no ethnic minority really like being labelled, be it BAME, People of Colour, etc so we simply shortened it to BiG. This is how we refer to the organisation internally anyway, as BAME in Games was quite a bit to type out every time.
At Amiqus, we have many resources available to help, so please do get in touch via
liz.prince@
amiqus.com
YOU ALSO LAUNCHED A MENTORSHIP PROGRAMME IN 2020. TELL US MORE ABOUT THIS. In September 2020, we partnered with Developing Minds, Studio Gobo, Electric Square and Prosepela, to develop an all-new virtual mentorship programme. The Games Digital Mentorship Programme empowers more diverse talents to work within the games and wider entertainment industry, through pairing mentees with seasoned industry professionals from leading studios. All participants receive free, online mentorship through the Prospela platform. Anyone interested in joining are most welcome, either as a mentee or mentor via
https://initiatives.prospela.com/big
BiG Chair Kish Hirani
TELL US ABOUT THE BIG REDI CALENDAR. In 2021, BiG set out to create a single publicly-accessible world calendar that stores and highlights significant occasions, international celebrations, cultural & religious events and pop cultures for everyone to reuse. The BiG Representation, Equality, Diversity, Inclusion ‘REDI’ Calendar aims to remove the ambiguity on how to acknowledge or celebrate any given event, and avoids the risk of offending a culture if got wrong, however well meaning. The focus is to have text/personal quotes submitted by those who are celebrating the day and submit some creative content with it whenever possible. This would also help highlight that individual’s creative portfolio.
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO RECOGNISE DIFFERENT RELIGIOUS HOLIDAYS AND OTHER SIGNIFICANT INTERNATIONAL DATES? It is a very easy way to show allyship for everyone to recognise and celebrate as well as learn about the significant occasions, international celebrations, cultural & religious events and pop cultures that are recognised all around the world. Some may even be obscure and unheard of! The whole aim is to learn and share the richness of culture from around the world, promoting inclusion and diversity.
HOW CAN STUDIOS AND INDIVIDUALS GET INVOLVED? We would love it for studios and individuals to submit their bespoke piece of art (or any other creative content) to help promote one of the events that they are celebrating or a day that has a special significance to them.
26 | MCV/DEVELOP February 2022
WHAT ARE BIG’S KEY AIMS AND AMBITIONS FOR 2022? The key aims and ambitions are to focus on building on the successful launch of the BiG REDI Calendar, as well as continuing to grow the BiG Mentorship Programme: REDI Calendar is currently only available by joining the BiG Discord and going to the REDI Calendar channel there. We are working on making it directly available for anyone who wishes to do so to embed it on their company website, Intranet and social media channels. With the BiG Mentorship Programme we want to get further involved with studios to help encourage staff to sign up as mentors. Where we still struggle is empowering allies to join as mentors to share their extensive experiences. There is still a wrong prescription that someone has to be an ethnic minority in order to mentor an ethnic minority. We really hope to bring back physical studio visits and networking events which were incredibly effective in getting potential developers to network and to physically see various studios, as well as listen to some of the journeys of the ethnic minority staff there in the format of a fireside chat. This is very much dependent on how the year pans out with the pandemic.
To find out more about BiG, visit
www.bameingames.org.
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