Peregrine Olander

Peregrine Olander is a digital storyteller, filmmaker, and photographer who specializes in collaborative, multicultural projects and strategic content creation.  She has 10 years of experience creating media that bridge cultures and tell stories across the United States, Africa, Asia, and Europe.  Her particular interests are content strategy, as well as impact: empowering people of all ages to reflect upon the ubiquity of media creation and how the creative process impacts people on an individual level.  She also questions brand and self in the process of media creation.  In addition to being able to address the technicalities of video production, Peregrine focuses on how the process of content creation can be used to connect people while targeting key objectives such as civic engagement, capacity building, reinforcing community, and targeting rural communities.  Peregrine was the executive producer for the PEPFAR-funded Behavior Change Communications platform in the Democratic Republic of the Congo which culminated in a televisions series, “Rien Que La Verité,” with between 3-5 million viewers per week.  Other highlights of this project, which ran from 2007-2010, include an album of original songs around the theme of HIV/AIDS education.  This album included collaboration of 13 top Congolese musicians,13 music videos, and an all-day concert for 30,000 people, featuring local and national NGO involvement.  During her time in the Congo, she also produced and co-directed three music videos raising awareness about gender-based violence as part of a U.S. Department of State initiative.  This project included a week-long workshop with American poet Toni Blackman, a group of Congolese musicians, and dancers.  In addition to her non-profit work, Peregrine has worked on the Webby-nominated “GE Show,” using video to explore brand and identity for the company General Electric, which helped to transition the company into the digital era.  She has worked as a mentor and trainer to international students during her time as the first Multimedia Producer and Photographer at The American University of Paris where she established the media strategy for the University.  In 2017, she was a trainer on Digital Storytelling and cell phone video production at YALI TechCamp Abidjan.  In March 2018, Peregrine led two conferences in Togo on Digital Storytelling and Social Media; one for young entrepreneurs and local NGOs in Kpalimé and one with media professionals and journalists in Lomé.  She has a Bachelor of Arts in French Literature and a Master of Arts in Global Communications from The American University of Paris in Paris, France.