01 / OUR STORY
From Being Left Out. To Building Our Own.
GenDAR is Generation for Development, Arts and Representation — a youth-led, feminist organisation and creative hub in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
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In 2018, a gender minority college student was denied access to a creative studio in Dar es Salaam simply because, according to the studio owners, “he looked different.” This exclusion was not an isolated experience. Creative spaces, workshops, and festivals repeatedly left the student off their lists. “This is not the space for you,” they said. For a young person seeking a place to express themselves, create, and belong, these experiences revealed a painful reality: creative spaces, which should nurture imagination and celebrate human expression, could also become sites of exclusion. Yet what began as an experience of deep vulnerability gradually became the foundation of a powerful commitment to activism, representation, and the right to create. In 2021, the student enrolled at university to pursue a Bachelor of Arts in Records, Archives and Information Management. Beyond the academic pursuit was a personal mission: to document, preserve, and archive the stories of gender minority communities whose experiences are too often excluded from official records, cultural histories, and public narratives. It was also a step towards reclaiming the space that these communities had so often been denied. Three years later, in 2024, a small movement was born in Dar es Salaam: GenDAR, informally understood as Gen Z in Dar. What began as a grassroots initiative grew into a formally registered non-profit organisation, Generation for Development, Arts and Representation (GenDAR). The name embodies a vision of a new generation using creativity, collective action, and inclusive representation to challenge inequalities and shape a more equitable society. Today, GenDAR is a youth-led, feminist organisation and creative hub and studio led by womxn and young people from communities experiencing systemic exclusion. Rooted in the belief that creativity is both a fundamental form of expression and a powerful tool for social change, GenDAR works to transform the very spaces that once shut people out. Through arts, ethical journalism, advocacy, and community-led initiatives, we create opportunities for people to express themselves, tell their stories, preserve their histories, and participate in shaping the cultural and social narratives of their communities. Our work centres on amplifying the voices, experiences, and leadership of womxn and gender minority youth, with particular attention to people living with HIV (PLHIV), sex workers (SW), and people who use drugs (PUD). We recognise that exclusion is rarely experienced in isolation. For many, barriers to creative participation intersect with stigma, discrimination, economic insecurity, and limited access to opportunities. Our work therefore goes beyond creating platforms for visibility; it seeks to strengthen agency, nurture leadership, and expand the possibilities available to communities too often pushed to the margins. At its heart, GenDAR is a story of transformation: from exclusion to expression, from silencing to storytelling, and from being denied access to building spaces of our own. What began with one person's experience has grown into a collective commitment to ensure that others do not have to face the same barriers alone. We are building the spaces we were once denied. We are preserving the stories that history risks forgetting. And we are creating a future in which womxn and young people, in all their diversity, can freely create, express themselves, and thrive. This is GenDAR: Generation for Development, Arts and Representation. A movement born from exclusion, growing through creativity, and driven by the conviction that everyone deserves a place in the story.
A collective commitment to belonging.OUR MISSION
To Advance Gender Equality, Equity, And Human Rights In And Through The Creative Sector.
OUR VISIONA society where women and young people, in all their diversity, can freely create, express themselves, and thrive in the creative sector.
