Jarrah Hodge continues to make her mark in the blogosphere.
Hodge's blog, Gender Focus, placed first in the Best Feminist Blog category in the 2011 Canadian Weblog Awards. The decision came after almost a month of evaluation by a jury made up of other Canadian bloggers.
"This is a really big honour," Hodge said. "I've been running Gender Focus for just over two years now, and it means a lot to have our work recognized."
The jury ranked nominated blogs on a series of criteria including accessibility, interactivity and design; attention to detail; and timeliness, originality and clarity of content.
Hodge, a University of British Columbia women's studies graduate, noted that neither she nor the other writers make any money from Gender Focus.
"It's just myself and a team of amazing volunteer contributors from across Canada sharing our perspectives on feminist and gender issues."
Gender Focus covers politics, pop culture and current events from a feminist perspective, with a particular aim of covering Canadian content not always addressed in other feminist blogs.
"We cover a huge range of issues, because practically everything has a gender angle to it," Hodge said in a news release. "And we know not all feminists or their allies share the same interests."
Hodge, a former constituency assistant to MLA Dawn Black, moved out of New Westminster but continues to be involved with the New Westminster NDP. She's also been involved in the New Westminster Community Action Committee for Women who Experience Violence, which offers the annual Purple Lights Campaign to highlight the need to put an end to domestic violence.
Gender Focus placed second in the same category at last year's Canadian Weblog Awards. You can find it at http: //gender-focus.com.
Locally, Hodge has also covered women's events for the blog Tenth to the Fraser.
In 2012, she's hoping to continue to explore a variety of topics on her blog. She's also in the process of developing a series of web videos answering frequently asked questions about feminism.
