Introducing our PHLAFF 2024 Cultural Producers in Residence -Jennifer Mota
We are so excited to announce Jenifer Mota as one of our 2024 Cultural Producer Residency Program!
Jennifer Mota is a Dominican-American multimedia journalist, music public scholar, multidisciplinary creative, and industry culture shifter. Mota first garnered media attention in 2019 with her article Recognizing Dominican Dembow: From Jamaica to El Alfa — the first investigated deep dive documenting Dominican dembow for U.S Latin mainstream media— highlighting the history and pioneers behind the sub-genre. Her expertise on the dembow scene scored her a monthly column in Remezcla, which she entitled “Si Tu Quiere Dembow,” as the first dembow columnist she reported on the genre’s past and present. In 2023, Remezcla included Mota in their annual Major Mujeres: Latinas Shaping the Industry list.
Mota received wider recognition for her writing and visual storytelling on the intersections of race, sex, and gender in music, Latine culture, and Caribbean identity — spearheading deep dives and visual productions on reggaeton and Afro-Latine stories during her time as a digital assistant for People en Español’s English-language vertical People Chica, where she produced stories highlighting old school and new talent of El Movimiento. Throughout the years, she’s interviewed some of the most prominent Latinx artists in the world, writing for Rolling Stone, Highsnobiety, Teen Vogue, VIBE, Pitchfork, Tidal, Billboard, THE FACE, The Fader and many more. Her on-camera catalog includes platforms like Yahoo’s Live Build Series, The Fader, The Boiler Room’s “Deconstructed Series,” Rapeton, Twitch, and ABC News’s ‘The Latin Music Revolution: A Soul of a Nation Presentation’ and her visual productions and script writing have appeared on Foot Locker, Amazon Music, Afro Punk, People en Español and KEXP.
Throughout her career, she’s written various culture-shifting pieces and deep dives including “Dominican Spanish Isn’t “Bad Spanish” — That Mentality Is Rooted in White Supremacy”, “Navigating Body Politics: My Journey with the Santa-Puta Complex”, and “How Hookah Infiltrated Dominican Music” for GQ Middle East alongside Journalist Nilo Tabrizy. As an independent creator and entrepreneur, she’s worked within the intersection of media, Digital Streaming Platforms, and the record label industry as a content producer, consultant, and copywriter; positioning her as an authority in artists’ branding and a Latine-marketing strategist for U.S-based artists and major labels.
The PHLAFF 2024 Cultural Producer Residency Program aims to nurture creative talent, promote cultural diversity, encourage and drive for cross-sector impacts and foster meaningful connections between artists and their greater community. Through this comprehensive residency experience, participants will not only develop their creative projects but also contribute to the vibrant cultural landscape of Philadelphia while aligning with PHLAFF's mission of celebrating and elevating Latine/x/a/o culture.