Selected articles and interviews
“The Real History Of Our African Queens Is Complex & Messy”, Black Ballad (2025)
“Schools are still hiding the violent truth of the British Empire”, The Lead (2025)
“Marta to Megan Rapinoe: Historic queer moments behind the Women’s World Cup”, GAY TIMES (2023)
“With more Child Qs in our midst, Black children deserve protection from police in schools”, The i Paper (2023)
“Cleared History” SCOPE Magazine, NYU (2022)
“It’s About Time Black Girls’s Voices Were Heard – & Girlhood Unfiltered Is The Start”, Bustle (2022)
“Carving Space with RAY BLK”, tmrw (2022)
“How The Pandemic Is Affecting Black LGBTQIA+ Communities Around The World”, British Vogue (2021)
“When trauma goes viral”, Cosmopolitan (2021)
“‘They will go back to not caring’: Surviving the cycle of people ‘discovering’ anti-black racism”,
The Independent (2020)
“Say Their Names: 12 Victims of Police and State Brutality in the UK”, VICE (2020)
“#SayHerName: Breonna Taylor & Toyin Salau Prove That Black Women Get Forgotten In The Fight Against Systemic Racism”, British Vogue (2020)
“The Anti-Black History Of Contraception”, Daye (2020)
“Historian Jade Bentil On Doing Justice To The Beauty & Sadness Of Black Women’s Lives”, Bustle (2019)
“What the Caster Semenya case says about misogynoir and transmisogyny in sport – and beyond”, Stylist (2019)
“This Collective Uses Life Drawing To Educate People About Sex Workers’ Rights”, Bustle (2019)
“How Black Pride became a vital part of London’s LGBTQ+ community”, Time Out London (2019)
“As Sudan falls deeper into crisis, it’s increasingly clear what’s missing: support from the international community”, The Independent (2019)
“Why So Many People Ignore LGBTQ Dating Violence”, Teen Vogue (2019)
“Meet Varaidzo, the woman using Instagram to teach Black British history”, Metro (2018)
“Black Panther and re-imagining Africa: an interview with Lupita and Danai”,
gal-dem (2018)
“A Wrinkle in Time and women of colour in fantasy: an interview with Ava, Oprah, Reese and Mindy”, gal-dem (2018)
“Diane Abbott and misogynoir: a woman scorned, a woman vindicated”, gal-dem (2017)
“Women’s march and the selective memory of mainstream feminism”,
gal-dem (2017)
“Why Tamir Rice’s murder hurts so much”, gal-dem (2015)
Oral histories
“Gal Wine: The Secret History of Sistermatic”, Crack Magazine (2023)
“‘They Thought I Was Dead’: Voices From Pivotal Moments in Black British History”, VICE (2020)
“A mum and her daughters share their experiences of being Black and British from 1957 to 2020”, Good Housekeeping (2020)
Cover stories
“GLAMOUR’s June coverstar Madison Bailey: ‘Pansexuality makes the most sense for how I feel’”, GLAMOUR (2021)
“Syd: The pacemaker”, Crack Magazine (2021)
Reviews
“Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody”, Time Out London (2022)
“Koffee: ‘Gifted’ review”, Crack Magazine (2022)
“Wahala by Nikki May”, The i Paper (2022)
Series
“Those Left Behind” – a four-part series with Black British families from different generations who have lost loved ones to police brutality, VICE (2021)
“The Street That Changed My Life – a series with well-known Londoners such as Yinka Bokinni, Lady Phyll, Travis Alabanza and more, Time Out London (2020-2021)
“Instagram and shadow-banning” – a two-part exploration into what shadow-banning is and how it affects marginalised communities, Bustle (2020)
Essays and book contributions
THE LGBTQ+ TRAVEL GUIDE (Lonely Planet, 2025)
THE BLACK HISTORY BOOK (DK, 2021)
THE QUEENS’ ENGLISH (Square Peg, 2021)
THE QUEER BIBLE (HQ, 2021)
LOUD BLACK GIRLS (4th Estate, 2020)
Script-writing
CANCELLED – a scripted weekly podcast that examined ‘cancel culture’ and individuals who had been ‘cancelled’ like Kate Forbes, Chris Brown, Graham Norton and Kate Clanchy (Broccoli Productions, 2022-2023)
Misc. work
Paula has written artist bios for the likes of Mahalia, Darkoo, Nia Archives, Ms Banks, Kah-Lo and more.
She occassionally freelances as a researcher, sensitivity reader and proofreader with a number of UK book publishers. Paula was also the Editorial Director for Fringe of Colour Responses, a Scotland-based publishing platform for Black and brown writers to respond to work by Black and brown artists.
More of her articles can be found on her Contently.
Paula Akpan 