FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 24, 2022

Contact: Rohit Mahajan | 202.530.4976 | mahajanr@rfa.org

Four wins for RFA digital brand 歪脑 | WHYNOT at Telly Awards

WASHINGTON - Radio Free Asia’s (RFA) online affiliate 歪脑 | WHYNOT won four prizes at the 43rd annual Telly Awards – earning one silver award for its special report “Preserving the Erased Decade of the Chinese Feminist Movement” and three for its docu-series “Caught in the Crossfire.” The two entries won across four of the Telly Awards’ categories, which judge the best work created within television and video, including Online Documentary and Non-scripted Web Series.  

“All the credit for this great achievement goes to the 歪脑 | WHYNOT team, whose superb reporting continues to earn well-deserved recognition,” RFA President Bay Fang said. “True to RFA’s core mission, 歪脑 | WHYNOT’s unique brand of story-telling provides young Mandarin-speakers around the world answers and accountability. These awards are a testament to its continued excellent work.”  

“We want to thank the Telly Awards for this incredible honor,” said Alex Zhang, Director of 歪脑 | WHYNOT. “In the two years since 歪脑 | WHYNOT launched, it’s very encouraging to continue to be recognized for our work to bring a fresh, often-missing journalistic perspective to our global audience.”

“Caught in the Crossfire” is a three-episode project that investigates the ordinary people impacted by the U.S.-China big-power rivalry, from scientists who were wrongly accused of being spies, to journalists caught up in the U.S.-China media war, and to activists fighting hog waste pollution in North Carolina at a Chinese-owned meat processing plant. “Preserving the Erased Decade of the Chinese Feminist Movement,” which won an Online News Association (ONA) award last year, examines the “lost” decade of the modern Chinese feminist movement. 

These awards mark the second instance 歪脑 | WHYNOT has won this year, having earned an Award of Excellence for “Preserving the Erased Decade of the Chinese Feminist Movement” at the 2022 Society of News Design competion. Since launching in the fall of 2020, the digital brand has won three major awards, while also earning a finalist status at this year’s New York Festivals Radio Awards and being named an honoree at the most recent Webby Awards. Other winners at the international contest, which received 11,000 entries from all over the world, include NBC, Al Jazeera, Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, and PBS Newshour. Founded in 1979, the Telly Awards annual competition showcases the best work in video and television across all screens. 

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Radio Free Asia is a private, nonprofit corporation broadcasting and publishing online news, information, and commentary in nine East Asian languages to listeners who do not have access to full and free news media.  RFA’s broadcasts seek to promote the rights of freedom of opinion and expression, including the freedom to “seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.” RFA is funded by an annual grant from the United States Agency for Global Media.