This is the sixth individual spotlight in series 2 of the “This Is What a Yogi Looks Like” (#whatayogilookslike) media series, a collaboration between the Yoga and Body Image Coalition and Yoga International based on the YBIC campaign that launched in 2014 and their continued work in challenging stereotypes, growing community, working collaboratively, and highlighting the diversity of yoga practitioners and yoga practices, as well as their staunch commitment to diversifying yoga media.
Excerpt from my interview with YBIC co-founder, Melanie Klein
And the lack of diversity in mainstream yoga culture and yoga imagery propelled you into action. First, you created the online community and forum Chelsea Loves Yoga, with the popular spotlight “Yogis in the Community,” but you’ve continued to grow and build off this foundation.
Yes, as a result of these experiences, I created Yoga, Literature, and Art Camp for Teen Girls at Spelman College Museum of Fine Art. I wanted to facilitate a space that normalized the beautiful diversity that exists across yoga communities. I wanted to ground the experience in the voices of women from the African Diaspora because these are the voices that are often silenced the most because of both race and gender. I wanted to offer a space that could be co-created with the youth participants, with their lived experiences as the focus. Read the full interview here.
