We commit to building and sustaining a welcoming, inclusive, and equitable community: an antiracist and anti-oppressive space where all individuals can participate freely and honestly.
We commit to working towards decolonizing theatre. We strive to recognize our own privilege, to use our platform to reflect the times and to advocate for historically marginalized voices at NU and beyond.
We commit to holding every member of our community accountable in moving towards a better future.
DEPARTMENT OF THEATRE COMMITMENTS:
adopted April 2020
COMMUNITY AND GENEROSITY
We commit to fostering conversations, exchanges, and experiences that empower, spark, and challenge us to think and act responsibly and empathetically among our artistic community at Northeastern University, in Greater Boston, and beyond.
ENGAGEMENT AND COLLABORATION
We commit to deconstructing the existing barriers of exclusion to motivate and uplift; we will foster relationships across cultural boundaries to facilitate an inclusive and accessible artistic community at Northeastern University, in Greater Boston, and beyond.
CREATIVITY AND RIGOR
We commit to looking beyond received wisdom to intentionally engage with high-quality and dynamic works, to ask hard questions about the world, our source materials, and who we are as people through creative exploration and self-expression.
RESPECT
We commit to acknowledging and embracing the unique identities of each and every member of our community; we promise to treat each other as equals, regardless of our differences, and to choose humanity in the face of conflict.
INTEGRITY
We commit to creating a diverse community where any individual can speak freely and honestly; we aim to recognize and use our privilege to advocate for underrepresented voices at Northeastern University, in Greater Boston, and beyond.
DEPARTMENT OF THEATRE – STATEMENT OF SOLIDARITY
June 4, 2020
Adapted from DNA Works – Dialogue and Healing through the Arts
Black Lives Matter.
Black students, staff and faculty matter.
Black families, histories, futures, bodies, hearts and minds matter.
Black, Indigenous, and People of Color matter.
Under-represented groups matter.
We, the faculty and staff of the Department of Theatre, grieve the murders of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and all lives lost and impacted by racial violence in the past weeks and in the past 400 years. We stand in solidarity with the Black students, staff and faculty in our department, our university, our city and our country.
We believe in the virtues of dialogue, patience and respect. We recognize our department’s and our field’s shortcomings and past mistakes. As educators, we are constantly learning and will hold ourselves to a higher standard. We will continue to implement and re-evaluate the Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Commitments we made in April 2020.
We are both witnesses to and participants in a movement for powerful systemic change. We recognize our privilege as part of this university, and we recognize our power to effect change. This is the time to re-examine our civic liberties and duties, and to use the power of our voices and our votes to ensure that all in our society can breathe freely. Systemic transformation will not be smooth, and we will stumble. Yet, we will turn our outrage into action, with a renewed commitment to end of all forms of racism and racial violence.
We know that, ultimately, we will be judged not for statements like these but for our actions going forward. We charge all of us to personally and collectively work toward the eradication of all forms of racism and racial violence. We thank those of you who are already doing this work. We thank those of you who are supporting people who are doing this work. We believe that peace is possible in our lifetimes.
RESOURCES
SARJ (our Department Social and Racial Justice Committee) has assembled an extensive collection of resources that can be found here: SARJ Resource List.
Organization Websites
- We See You, White American Theatre
- Dialogue and Healing through the Arts
- Black Lives Matter
- Showing Up For Racial Justice
- 21-Day Racial Equity and Social Justice Challenge
- artEquity
- Equal Justice Initiative
- The People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond
- The Black Theatre Commons
- Broadway for Black Lives Matter
Resource Lists
- Acting Out’s Master BLM Spreadsheet
- Activism & Allyship Guide – Prepared by the [email protected] Airbnb Employee Resource Group
- Scaffolded Anti-Racism Resources
- Resources for Anti-Racist Action May-June 2020
- Alternative Canon
- #BIPOCSwap List
Articles
- Performing Whitness by Sarah Bellamy
- “11 Things To Do Besides Say ‘This Has To Stop’ In The Wake Of Police Brutality”
- “How to Tell the Difference Between Real Solidarity and ‘Ally Theater'”
- Helm’s Stages of White Racial Identity Development
- Anti-racist Pedagogy: from faculty’s self-reflection to organizing within and beyond the classroom by Kyoko Kishimoto
Books
- White Fragility by Robin d’Angelo
- Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds by adrienne maree brown
- Post-Traumatic Slave Syndrome by Dr. Joy DeGruy
- Black Acting Methods by By Sharrell Luckett and Tia M. Shaffer
- How to be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
Films
- 13th available on Netflix
- Crip Camp
- Dawnland
- Disclosure
- PRIDE
Podcasts
- 1619
- About Race with Reni Eddo-Lodge
- All My Relations
- Bitter Brown Femmes
- Building Our Own Tables
- Code Switch
- Daughters of Lorraine
- Disability Visibility
- Dyking Out – A Lesbian and LGBTQIA Podcast for Everyone
- Finding Our Way
- Good Ancestor
- The Henceforward
- Intersectional Feminism – Desi Style!
- Intersectionality Matters with Kimberlé Crenshaw
- Marsha’s Plate: Black Trans Podcast
- Still Processing
- Stories from Home: Living the Just Transition Podcast
- The Trans Questioning Podcast
Inclusive Casting