About Shameless
Shameless is Canada’s independent voice for smart, strong, sassy young women. It’s a fresh alternative to typical teen magazines, for girls who know there’s more to life than makeup and diet tips. Packed with articles about arts, culture and current events, Shameless reaches out to readers who are often ignored by mainstream media: freethinkers, queer youth, young women of colour, punk rockers, feminists, intellectuals, artists, activists — people just like you! We tackle teen life with wit and wisdom.
Proudly independent, Shameless is a grassroots magazine produced by a team of volunteer staff members, with content guided by a teen advisory board.
Each issue of Shameless entertains and inspires with profiles of amazing women, discussion of the hot topics that concern you most, DIY guides to crafty activities, sports dispatches, the latest in technology, columns on food politics, health & sexuality, advice and more.
Shameless has been making waves since its launch in June 2004. That year, Shameless was named Best New Magazine by Toronto alt-weekly NOW and nominated for two Utne Independent Press Awards (Best New Title and Best Design). In 2005, Shameless won an Utne award for Best Personal Life Writing. We were nominated again in 2006, for Lifestyle coverage. In 2005, cover story “Making The Cut” was nominated for a National Magazine Award.
Published three times a year, Shameless is available in independent bookstores and Chapters/Indigo locations across Canada and select locations in the United States.
Who we are
Shameless is a grassroots publication produced by a team of volunteer staff members. Rooted in feminism and DIY culture, we are creative, sassy and actively involved in the independent media and arts communities.
Megan Griffith-Greene, Editor
Megan Griffith-Greene’s experience spans activism, arts and journalism. Raised in Toronto, Megan became an active advocate on youth rights, social justice and education issues while in high school. Megan studied cultural studies and fine arts at York University, and journalism at Ryerson, where she was editor of the Ryerson Review of Journalism (Spring 2004). She is also a founding editor and designer of The New Pollution new music review, a web-based magazine and podcast on indie music that launched in February 2006.
megan@shamelessmag.com
Kate Rae, Features Editor
Kate Rae has been a freelance writer/editor for a long, long time. A past (and occasionally too frank, according to her gran) contributor to Chatelaine, she is currently the senior features editor for glow magazine. She also was a volunteer at the Toronto Rape Crisis Centre/Multicultural Women Against Rape for nine years, working on the crisis line and as a collective member. Kate is delighted to be working with the incredible, talented women at Shameless.
kate@shamelessmag.com
piKe krpan, Reviews Editor
Pike Krpan is a queer community and anti-racist activist, graduate
student, and performance poet. Originally from Alberta, she now lives in
Toronto. She studied women’s studies and international development studies
at Trent University in Peterborough, where she also was a member of the
Peterborough Coalition Against Poverty (PCAP) and Arthur Student and
Community Newspaper. She wrote literary review and queer culture columns for
that newspaper for 2 years before organizing and editing a special 16-page
Queer Lines supplement in March 2004. She now lives in Toronto and works as
a researcher, editor and writer. You can find her writing in Shameless,
This! Magazine, Eye Weekly, and in the office-vaults of her professors. She
is also a co-editor at Descant Magazine. A firm believer in the power of
words to create freedom, she has also worked for PEN Canada.
pike@shamelessmag.com
Holland Gidney, Circulation and Subscriptions Manager
Holland Gidney is originally from Victoria, B.C., but Toronto has grudgingly adopted her as one of its own despite her tendency to complain about the cold in the winter and the smog in the summer. She hopes to soon complete her Master’s degree in Publishing by finally getting around to writing her thesis this summer — please hold her to it. In the meantime, she keeps busy with a ridiculous amount of multi-tasking and frequent dealings with Canada Post. Holland believes the best way to support the magazines you love is to subscribe (that way, they’ll love you back).
holland@shamelessmag.com
Sheila Sampath, Art Director
Sheila’s 11-year awkward phase, combined with a childhood on the mean, homogenous streets of Mississauga West, hardened her into the design saboteur that she is today. A graduate of the University of Toronto and the School of Design, Sheila uses her little Mac to make big statements on behalf of groups she really believes in. She’s designed for the Toronto Rape Crisis Centre/Multi-cultural Women Against Rape and the Women and Gender Studies Institute at the University of Toronto. She was also an editorial collective member of Big Boots. When she’s not working, Sheila is usually found crafting, playing dress-up and riding her bicycle to and from shows.
sheila@shamelessmag.com
Stacey May Fowles, Publisher
Stacey May Fowles is a writer and magazine enthusiast based in Toronto. Her writing has appeared in Fireweed, Misunderstandings, subTERRAIN, and Kiss Machine, and she has assisted in circulation and business development projects for Descant: A Journal of Arts and letters and Hive Magazine. Her first novel is out with Tightrope Books, and she is currently working on a collection of short stories. You can find her at www.staceymayfowles.com.
staceymay@shamelessmag.com
Cate Simpson, Web Editor
Cate grew up in Edinburgh, Scotland, where last year she finished a degree in Philosophy before moving to Toronto to make her fortune in freelance journalism. She spent most of her adolescence on the internet, and very little has changed except that now sometimes being on the internet qualifies as “working.” She writes for Xtra, Torontoist, The List, and anyone else who will answer her emails.
cate@shamelessmag.com
Wesley Fok, Webmaster
As the webmaster for Shameless, Wesley painstakingly created this website for your consumption by carefully gluing together the individual pixels on your screen using a very small glue stick. The pixels were sourced from a unionized fabrication plant in Louisiana and are made of equal parts light and magic.
webmaster@shamelessmag.com
Nicole Cohen, Founding Editor
Nicole is the co-founder and former co-editor of Shameless. She has written for a variety of media, including Eye Weekly, Rabble.ca, the Toronto Star, This Magazine, Herizons, Relay, Broken Pencil, Briarpatch and Coach House Books. Nicole is currently working on her PhD in the graduate program in communication and culture at York University. She is involved in several media-related projects, including Media Action and Upping The Anti: A Theory of Journal and Action. Nicole writes the Media Savvy column for Shameless.
nicole@shamelessmag.com
Melinda Mattos, Founding Editor
Melinda is the co-founder and former co-editor of Shameless. When Melinda was a teenager, the media tried to convince her that her breasts were too small, her brain was too big and her life would be incomplete if she didn’t have a boyfriend. When she got a bit older, she fought back by starting her own teen mag. Melinda has a Bachelor of Journalism from Ryerson University and has worked at The Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, TVOntario, Magazines Canada and Eye Weekly. She writes The Last Word, a column about language, for Shameless.
melinda@shamelessmag.com
Editorial collective
Shameless is guided by a teen editorial collective who give us feedback on the magazine, share ideas, help plan events, inspire us and give us a window into the lives of real teenagers. They make sure the magazine is relevant, interesting and engaging.
Current members of our collective include: Nadia Alam, Sarah Chepesiuk, Heidi Cho, Elliot Carol Chow, Genevieve Flavelle, Lex Gill, Laura Hope, Maddie Lee, Kristin Li, Nevena Martinovic, Olivia Mussells, Linda Paolucci, Julie Sadler, Samantha Williams.
