Joy Donnell, Munika Lay & Nicole Haggard

CIME’s founders are a team of content creators, academics, and activists who came together when they were all nominated as 50 Women Changing the World Through Media and Entertainment. Their combined experience offers unique insight about where the needs of the audience and the needs of the industry intersect.

JOY DONNELL is a producer, writer and strategist dedicated to the psychospiritual power of storytelling. Her work has been featured in W Magazine, HuffPost, and Vogue Italia to name a few. Her first book, Beyond Brand, explores the intersection of personal development and personal branding for legacy building through the media. Joy’s latest short documentary, Inseparable from the Sunlight, shines a lens on our innate human connection to plants, the Earth, and our cosmos. Her newest book, Show Us Your Fire, examines the power of disruption and our birthright to self-compassion. Joy also serves on the NASA Astrophysics Database of IDEA Practitioners.

MUNIKA LAY is an independent producer. Her current film and TV projects include AN OAKLAND HOLIDAY, which was featured on the latest Black List. Munika’s producing credits include THE ART OF SELF-DEFENSE, THE CLOVEHITCH KILLER, and the documentary RECORDER: THE MARION STOKES PROJECT. Previously, Munika was the Senior Vice President of Film at Miramar, overseeing the development and production of features like HE’S ALL THAT and MOTHER/ANDROID. She joined Miramax from MGM, where she worked on CANDYMAN, LEGALLY BLONDE, and other legendary franchises. Prior to that, she was an executive at Paramount and Warner Bros., and she launched her career at QED International and WME.

DR. NICOLE HAGGARD is an award-winning instructor, speaker and published researcher with over twenty years of study contextualizing the intersection of race and gender in American culture. Dr. Nicole is a faculty member in the Film, Media, and Social Justice program at Mount Saint Mary’s University and a Faculty Fellow for their Center for the Advancement of Women. She also spent time as the Director of Communications for the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. Dr. Nicole has been a featured expert for outlets like TedX, Variety, and SXSW. She recently completed a groundbreaking research project with Amazon Films and the See Change Institute and will be releasing her monograph Race, Sex, and Hollywood.

Their talks include:

• Lunch & Learn: Has your org done DEI 101? Need something fresh and new to keep the team building going? This program uses accessible pop culture to show how TV/Film story patters impact our biases about race and gender.
• Keynotes & Firesides: We connect current events to our on-screen stories to learn, unlearn, and relearn so that we can own our narratives.
• Hollywood Hidden History: This workshop is tailored to entertainment industry professionals and cohorts. It helps them see beyond data and box office figures. Learn the industry’s hidden history of race and gender on screen. Leave empowered to Heal, Rise, and Create.
• Curated Series: Need to explore a topic relevant to your team? We can curate topics including Body Size, Afro-Latinas, Consent/Rape Culture, Multi-Racial Families, Juneteenth, Award Season, and more.