Theatre Professor Co-develops Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Intimacy Initiative

Assistant Professor of Acting Kaja Dunn and Brian Eugenio Herrera, an associate professor of theatre at the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University, have together developed the The Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Intimacy Initiative (EDIII) to address inequities in theatrical training spaces. The initiative is led by Theatrical Intimacy Education, a consulting group specializing in researching, developing, and teaching best practices for staging theatrical intimacy.

The EDII begins with four actions: The EDIII Summit, scheduled for March 2020; the creation of an Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Scholarship to provide full-tuition scholarships to Theatrical Intimacy Education workshops; relationship-building with HBCUs and theatre training programs and professional Latinx, Asian American, Middle Eastern, Indigenous, and Black Theatres nationwide; and Intimacy Training workshops specifically for self-identified people of color. Learn more in this article in American Theatre.

Dunn’s research into Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion issues in theatre addresses the decolonization of theatre in pedagogy and in the profession. Her most recent publication is the essay “Hidden Damage: When Uninformed Casting and Actor Training Disregard the Effect of Character Embodiment on Student of Color,” published in Volume 27 of the Theatre Symposium Series, issued by The University of Alabama Press.