Ep. 41: Honoring children’s imaginations with Sandhya Nankani, founder of inclusive kids media company Literary Safari & The Story Seeds Podcast

Growing up in a family of Sindhi entrepreneurs based in Morocco and Ghana, my guest Sandhya Nankani grew up speaking French, Twi, English and Sindhi. Join me as she shares what it was like growing up between Ghana, India and the US, and how she came to launch her children’s media production studio Literary Safari. Her studio focuses on using evidence-based research to inform its inclusive creations (podcasts, apps, games and curriculum) that celebrate diversity and global citizenship. The award-winning NYC-based studio has worked on projects for UNESCO, Sesame Workshop, Scholastic and also recently launched its own podcast: Story Seeds.

We chat multicultural childhoods, favorite podcasts for kids and their grown-ups, and even Amitabh Bachchan! Full conversation below, on your favorite podcast app, Spotify or iTunes and please take a second to rate us wherever you’re listening so the voices of these inspiring women can be heard all over the world!

SHOWNOTES FOR EPISODE 41:

• Sandhya’s studio Literary Safari’s website and her instagram

• The Story Seeds Podcast

• Kids' Activity Book: Imagination Lab: Experiments in Creativity

  www.storyseedspodcast.com/activitybook

• KIDMAP (Kids' Inclusive and Diverse Media Action Project)

BOOKS WE DISCUSSED:

• The Unexplainable Disappearance of Mars Patel by Sheela Chari

• The Mars Patel podcast

• Caste by Isabel Wilkerson

Sandhya’s favorite podcasts:

• Song Exploder

• Ten Percent Happier

• Poetry Unbound

Follow us on Instagram for more on Sandhya and everything we mentioned in this episode!

Special thanks to Varun Dhabe, Aman Moroney and the team @ Boon Castle / Flying Carpet Productions for audio post-production engineering!