One of the Sierra Leonean women filming her story as part of the workshop.
Sierra Leone remains one of the most dangerous places in the world to give birth. Behind every statistic are real women navigating this reality every day, women facing limited access to quality healthcare, deep-rooted gender inequality, and harmful traditional practices. At Aminata Maternal Foundation, in partnership with the Mothers of Sierra Leone, we believe that only the women living these experiences can truly capture their depth and truth.
“Our Western perspectives will never be equivalent to Sierra Leonean perspectives… the women themselves can share these stories better than anybody,” said Julia Killar, Mothers of Sierra Leone member.
Mothers of Sierra Leone is a Global Social Impact Fellowship from Lehigh University. They are also a film and research team committed to ensuring that Sierra Leonean women lead the storytelling about their own lives. Their work reshapes how the world understands motherhood in Sierra Leone through narratives that honour truth, reclaim agency, and celebrate the power of women’s voices.
With support from the foundation, the team facilitated three grassroots filmmaking workshops in August 2025 across Makeni, Freetown, and Yoni, engaging 20 women and mothers. Participants learned how to film, edit, and share their experiences using mobile phones and other accessible tools, ensuring storytelling remains sustainable and widely shareable across platforms like WhatsApp and TikTok.
By the end of the program, every participant had produced a short film and gained practical skills in interviewing, editing, and narrative building. This initiative stands as a powerful step forward, not only in telling the stories of motherhood in Sierra Leone but in ensuring those stories are owned, shaped, and shared by the women themselves.
Sierra Leonean mothers are reclaiming the narrative of childbirth and motherhood through grassroots filmmaking. With support from Aminata Maternal Foundation and Mothers of Sierra Leone, 30 women learned to document and share their lived experiences, ensuring their stories are told by them, not for them.
Watch more films by Mothers of Sierra Leone: