What is The Representation Project and when was it founded (year)?

1. How the founding year is reported and why it matters

Public-facing materials and nonprofit profiles consistently report 2011 as the founding year for The Representation Project, which matters because it ties the organization’s origin directly to the release and public reception of the documentary Miss Representation produced by Jennifer Siebel Newsom. The group’s official site and organizational summaries frame the nonprofit as an outgrowth of the film’s impact, describing a deliberate move from a single documentary to a sustained advocacy and educational entity. These accounts emphasize the strategic timing—establishing the organization in 2011—so that its early identity, programming, and outreach are understood as responding to the film’s reception and the cultural conversations that followed ^{[1] [4] [5]}. 2011 anchors the narrative that the film catalyzed an institutional response.

2. Sources that explicitly state April 2011 and what that specificity implies

A subset of records provides a more precise founding date—April 2011—which is reported in authoritative nonprofit or archival summaries and suggests that the organization’s formalization was prompt after the film’s initial release and reception. This specificity appears in organizational histories and third‑party nonprofit directories that compile registration or incorporation data; such details are valuable for researchers tracking the organization’s legal formation, early funding, and program rollouts. The April 2011 timestamp has been cited alongside descriptions of the nonprofit’s mission and early projects, reinforcing the timeline that the documentary’s distribution and public dialogue precipitated the formal establishment of The Representation Project as a 501(c)^[6] entity ^{[2] [3]}. The April detail converts a year-long claim into a verifiable administrative moment.

3. Founder identity and organizational mission—consistent across sources

All analyzed sources uniformly identify Jennifer Siebel Newsom as the founder and frame the organization’s mission around harnessing film and media for cultural change, with education and activism components. This consensus simplifies factual verification: the founder’s authorship of Miss Representation is consistently presented as the causal origin of the nonprofit’s agenda. Organizational profiles and third‑party entries repeatedly characterize the group as a gender watchdog and filmmaking nonprofit that leverages documentaries and campaigns to challenge stereotypes and encourage policy and cultural shifts, which aligns across the organization’s own descriptions and independent summaries ^{[1] [7] [5]}. Founder identity and mission are uncontested in the record provided.

4. Divergent or caveated accounts and how to read them

Not all materials are equally explicit about the founding year; some profiles infer the founding timeframe from the film’s 2011 release rather than citing incorporation paperwork. Those caveated accounts are still consistent with the 2011 founding narrative but reflect different authorial approaches: one source infers timing from the film’s impact, while another provides a specific month, April 2011. This variation matters for precision-focused work—legal, academic, or journalistic—because an inferred year is weaker evidence than a documented incorporation date. The presence of both kinds of statements—explicit month and inferred year—indicates convergence around 2011 while reminding readers to prefer primary records (incorporation filings, nonprofit registries) when absolute specificity is required ^{[8] [9] [2]}. Differing phrasing signals differences in source type and evidentiary standard.

5. Assessing source perspectives and potential agendas

The sources include the organization’s own site, nonprofit registries, and third‑party watchdogs; each carries different institutional perspectives. Organizational pages present a mission-driven narrative linking the film and founding, which serves advocacy and fundraising aims. Third‑party profiles and charity‑monitoring entries summarize or corroborate those claims, sometimes adding administrative details like nonprofit status or specific founding months. Conversely, watchdog or influence‑tracking outlets may frame the nonprofit in broader contexts that highlight relationships and funding patterns, which can signal different analytical priorities. Readers should treat the consensus on 2011 (and April 2011 where cited) as robust across these perspectives while recognizing that organizational storytelling and external summaries serve distinct informational and institutional functions ^{[1] [4] [9] [5]}.