Platforming inclusion at U.S. media industry events: confronting Hollywood’s lack of representational diversity

ABSTRACT Incremental structural adjustments define attempts to advance representational diversity in Hollywood. This essay considers U.S. media industry events as catalysts for change. Using the 2020 Austin Film Festival and Writers Conference as a case study, I examine how attendees platformed the topic of inclusion after summer protests reignited calls for equity throughout media industries. Participant observation across the festival's virtual spaces locates my critical deconstruction of four panels wherein representation of historically underrepresented groups, including Black, Indigenous, and other people of color (BIPOC), was a focal point. Although the festival did not overtly engage with the political moment, it platformed people who did. Conversations on craft fed into a ubiquitous conference concern with “truth” in storytelling, foregrounding sociohistorical contexts and individual specificities when representing diverse experiences, and highlighting positionality when empowering writers to tell their stories. Despite the constraints of dominant production norms, events enable underrepresented groups and their allies to shape industry discourses.