Broadly Documentary Video

Since Broadly was founded, we've used documentary video storytelling to help us understand, express, and navigate our identities. Over the past few years, we found ourselves casting love spells with witches in Romania, meeting with virgins at a bride market in Bulgaria, dancing in a women-only village in Kenya, and following Satanic activists as they protested across the US. Some of our favorite videos are below.

Two years after we met one of the most powerful witches in Romania, Mihaela Minca, we went back to witness the marriage of her son Antonio to his cousin Beatrice, a young witch herself. Catching up with old subjects and getting to see a wedding fit for royalty—and the drama that followed—made this piece particularly unforgettable and fun to watch.

In this Broadly Special, staff writer and host Diana Tourjée spends the day with Eva Tiamat Medusa, a trans woman who modified her body to become a dragon. This video turned out to be a surprisingly emotional journey that taught us more about what it means to be human than we expected.

In 2016, Broadly went to Nepal to witness the centuries-old tradition of worshipping Kumari, a living goddess manifested in the body of a young girl, to see how life is for the sacred children spending their lives in a temple—and what happens when they grow up.

Where the foothills of Mount Kenya merge into the desert, the people of Samburu have maintained a strict patriarchy for over 500 years in northern Kenya. That is, until 25 years ago, when Rebecca Lolosoli founded Umoja village as a safe haven for the region's women. Umoja, which means "unity" in Swahili, is quite literally a no man's land, and the matriarchal refuge is now home to the Samburu women who no longer want to suffer abuses at the hands of men. Broadly visited Umoja and the villages it inspired to meet with the women who were fed up with living in a violent patriarchy.

Every spring, the country’s 18,000-person Kalaidzhi Roma clan gathers in Stara Zagora for the controversial “bride market” where young virgins are paraded in front of suitors who bid on them. Broadly visited the "bride market" to hear from the women themselves on how this tradition impacts their lives.

Amidst rising violence and an onslaught of clinic closures, the Satanic Temple is fighting to protect women's right to safe and legal abortion. We followed Satanic activists from across the country to find out why.

Danica Roem made history when she became the first openly transgender person to be elected and seated to a state legislature. Broadly had exclusive access to Roem in the final hours of her campaign.