Liberated teaching fosters
authentic creative expression, playful problem-solving, and genuine connections in order to reimagine a world that welcomes us all.
Public School residencies
BAX’s CARE(D) (Creative and Resilient Exchanges through Dance/Drama) Programming, which Kelindah co-developed, uses dramatic play to foster empathy around identity and build connection across difference. These 8-12 week residencies support students to express themselves and their identities with confidence as well as celebrate each others identities. They learn to disagree respectfully, compromise generously, and build performances that represent each of their unique voices. In rehearsal, students practice navigating conflict thoughtfully. They hone their upstander skills so that when they witness situations of discrimination and bias inside and outside of the classroom, they are empowered to take appropriate action.
In addition to working with students, Kelindah facilitates workshops for families, educators, and administrators, about how dramatic storytelling can be used as a vehicle for cultivating compassion and engaging in conversations across difference, with the goal of building inclusive, respectful communities.
Youth & TEEN Drag Classes
Through a weekly residency at BAX and guest workshops at youth theaters such as New England Youth Theater, Kelindah offers Drag Performance workshops for youth, pre-teens, and teenagers. In these workshops, students explore drag performance’s rich contemporary cultural context as they begin to develop their own performance persona. Through character work, costume exploration, creative movement, and improvisation, students develop original lip sync musics with cohesive narrative arcs.
Drag education programs are developmentally-appropriate and tailored to the age group. For younger audiences, this looks like building confidence and strengthening self-expression muscles through creative movement, costume exploration, imagination games, lip sync, and embodied storytelling.
Inspired by Drag’s historic legacy as an art form of resistance, Kelindah believes that Drag education can empower us to create a world free of bias. If we can reenvision ourselves through the performative and aesthetic tools of Drag, we can change how we see others and in doing so, reshape our communities toward radical acceptance.
