The following resources have been compiled by Abigail De Kosnik with special thanks to Miyoko Conley, Robin Davidson, Ben Dillon, Josh Frachiseur, Srijani Ghosh, and Julia Havard.
To request to have resources added to this page, please email Prof. De Kosnik at adekosnik@berkeley.edu
Pursuing Social Justice through Conversations between Course Readings and the Real World
Assignments developed for the Lecturer Teaching Fellows Program
Format: PDF
Contributed by Srijani Ghosh
Contributor's Note: In my R1A and R1B classes (discussion-oriented), I have frequently noticed that many students feel that issues such as racism, or gender inequality, or Islamophobia, happened "back then," even when Black Lives Matter, the #metoo movement, or President Trump's "Muslim ban" were the leading news headlines. This outlook that we live in a post-racist, post-sexist, or post-feminist world leads to the mistaken assumption that diversity, equity, and inclusion have already been achieved in the socio-cultural spaces that we inhabit, and no further individual or community initiatives are particularly necessary.
Proposed Solution: A set of exercises/assignments (individual & collaborative) that instructors in the humanities, fine arts, and social sciences can use to stimulate students to make connections between their course readings and the real world and be cognizant of the ongoing need for our collective efforts to actively work towards social justice in our communities and foster a culture of equity and inclusion.
Please avoid using insensitive language
Combination of documents used in THEATER 118AC and NWMEDIA 151AC, 2019–2020
Format: Google Doc
Contributed by Abigail De Kosnik
Contributor's Note: This document addresses students' assignment submissions for this class which contained offensive language regarding various identity categories. Lashon Daley, a GSI for the class, initiated an email thread for "triggering responses" that all of the GSIs and I were reading in students' work, and everyone contributed to that email thread. I then listed out all of the terms listed in that email thread, put them in this google doc, and wrote out why these terms are offensive, which terms I wished students to use instead in their assignments, and one or more links to scholarly and/or journalistic articles providing deeper information about the history and background of each term or phrase.
Points will be deducted if you cite untrustworthy or disreputable sources
Used in NWMEDIA 151AC, 2020
Format: Google Doc
Contributed by Abigail De Kosnik
Contributor's Note: We had some issues with students citing fake news/misinformation sources in their course assignments, so, on the advice of Alfred Day at Student Affairs, we decided to start deducting points if student work referenced fake news sources going forward.
Anti-Oppressive Composition Pedagogies
Special issue of Radical Teacher, 2019
Format: PDF
Contributed by Julia Havard
Special issue of Radical Teacher, 2016
Format: PDF
Contributed by Julia Havard
White Supremacy and 'Free Speech' on College Campuses: A (Digital) Toolkit
Contributed by Julia Havard
Format: Google Docs
Contributor's Note: These toolkits are anti-fascist and anti-white supremacist resources, compiled by UC graduate students and faculty. They were created in response to the wave of white supremacist presence on UC campuses in 2017 in the name of "free speech."
Disability and Political Education: An Activist Toolbox
Contributed by Julia Havard
Format: Google Doc
Contributor's Note: This is a toolkit with resources on accessibility, Disability Justice (a framework for collective liberation created by queer and trans disaled people of color), and COVID created during the Cal COLA movement in Spring 2020.
Skin, Tooth, and Bone: The Basis of Movement Is Our People, A Disability Justice Primer
By Sins Invalid (Second Edition, 2019)
Formats: Digital & Printed Publication
Digital edition available to download for $7.00
Contributed by Julia Havard
Literature and the Real World Assignment
Used in Theater R1B, 2020
Format: Google Doc
Contributed by Srijani Ghosh
Contributor's Note: In my discussion-based Theater R1B classes, I regularly find that students treat texts (I include 4 realist plays as required reading) and their themes as a sort of bubble that is dealt with only during the class period without much (or any) relevance outside class. I also find that students are sometimes not wholly aware of current events themselves and are therefore not able to make quite apparent connections between what is happening in the text to what is making news headlines. For example, students' comments suggest that we live in a post-racist/post-sexist/postfeminist world, and that "those things," such as racism, or gender inequality, or Islamophobia, happened "back then," even when Black Lives Matter, the #metoo movement, or President Trump's "Muslim ban" were the leading news headlines in the present day. After several challenges with trying to make students see the parallels between the topics discussed in class through the medium of fiction and their prevalence in the real world, I decided to flip the classroom and nudge students to discover these connections on their own. The assignment description linked above is based on a New York Times student challenge.
I am happy to report that this assignment has proven to be successful in getting students to engage in critically thinking about the connections between the course readings and everyday life. Students are often stunned to realize that what they understood to have happened "back then" [as mentioned above] is still a part of our everyday life in the present. Students, for instance, have connected the racial discrimination experienced by the fictional Younger family in A Raisin in the Sun circa 1950s to the reality of the African American community being disproportionately impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 as well as the way African American millennials currently feel like the American Dream is out of their reach due to unequal opportunities.
Directory of BIPOC Theater Designers and Technicians
Compiled by Megan Sandberg-Zakian
Format: Google Doc / Spreadsheet
Contributed by Jamila Cobham
Berkeley Center for New Media (BCNM) Indigenous Technologies Project Website
BCNM's Indigenous Technologies Syllabus
BCNM's YouTube Channel (with recordings of all Indigenous Technologies events)
Contributed by Abigail De Kosnik
Formats: Google Doc & Videos
Contributor's Note: The Berkeley Center for New Media (BCNM) launched a project called Indigenous Technologies in Fall 2020, consisting of an ongoing lecture series by Indigenous scholars, activists, and artists, and an Indigenous Technologies Syllabus available to all as a Google Doc.
#CiteBlackScholars: Black Dance Scholarship by Black Dance Scholars
Format: Google Doc
Contributed by SanSan Kwan
Formative Assessment Strategies to Support Student Learning
Universal Design for Learning: Core Principles & Sample Strategies
Culturally Responsive Teaching
Adapted from the Eberly Center by UC Berkeley's Center for Teaching and Learning, 2019
Format: Google Doc (CalNet login required)
Contributed by Marisella Rodriguez
Embodying Your Curriculum Website
Contributed by Lisa Wymore
Contributor's Note: I attended an interesting international conference on somatic education (2021) and heard a presentation by two women who run this organization: Anita Chari and Angelica Singh.
Their work addresses racism and oppression in the classroom by reflecting on trauma (not just the students' trauma, but also the trauma the instructor has personally and brings into the space). They had some great embodied practices to share.
Methodology Resources for Theater Training
BIPOC Playwrights Resources; Databases and Links; Method Texts for Actors and Directors
Formats: Google Docs & PDFs
Contributed by Peter Glazer & Jessica Berman
Contributor's Note: These materials were collected to support acting, directing and playwriting faculty in the development of anti-racist practices and readings for courses, syllabi, productions and workshops. As members of the Acting, Directing, and Playwriting Subcommittee of the Undergraduate Curriculum Committee in TDPS, we wanted to offer methodological resources for our practice classrooms written by BIPOC practitioners and scholars, and with anti-racist priorities.
Examples of Feedback for Problematic Language in Essays
Format: Google Doc
Contributed by Miyoko Conley
Contributor's Note: This document has suggestions and anonymized examples for feedback when students write insensitive things in essays. Please note these are for essays that are grounded in beliefs that are racist, sexist, ableist, transphobic, homophobic, ethnocentric, etc., not simply a student using insensitive language because they do not know correct terms. These suggestions came from an experience teaching one particular class and were made in collaboration with Prof. Abigail De Kosnik and GSI Lashon Daley. For the class, we also consulted with Dean Alfred Day in Student Affairs.