Get in touch with us!
If you have any suggestions, questions or ideas for our committee, email diversity@americantheatrecritics.org. To pitch stories or book an individual critic to serve as a panelist or keynote, please contact the critic directly.
BEID Resource Hub
Belonging, Equity, Inclusion & Diversity Resource Hub
In the American Theatre Critics Association, we understand everyone has a different cultural identity which determines how they view the world. This cultural identity does not go away when a professional critic enters the theater, which is why we are dedicated to the continuing education of our members. We embrace all abilities, ethnicities, gender identities, races, religions and sexualities. People are people first, we just prefer them onstage.
Diverse Critics List
The Belonging, Equity, Inclusion & Diversity Committee maintains a list of member and non-member theater critics who identify as a woman, non-white/person of color and/or non-binary. If you are a professional critic who identifies as a woman, non-white/person of color and/or non-binary, and would like to be included on the list, complete this form.
Resources
Race & Ethnicity
- Race/Ethnicity Glossary
- Equity Quotient
- ArtEquity
- Understanding institutional racism from Racial Equity Tools
- What are microaggressions?
- A self-assessment for racial awareness
- Racial equity impact assessment
- Hard Conversations: An Introduction to Racism, a four-week intensive online course facilitated by authors and social justice activists, Patti Digh and Victor Lee Lewis
- People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond Undoing Racism workshop
Ability & Mental Health
- Autism and identity first language
- Six ways your activism might be ableist
- Disability etiquette
- “Disability and Theatre: A Practical Manual for Inclusion in the Arts” (a book recommended by StateraArts.org)
- “I’m not your inspiration, thank you very much” TEDxSydney talk by Stella Young
- Respectful Disability Language
Religions, Beliefs & Belonging
About the Belonging, Equity, Inclusion & Diversity Committee
The mission of the Belonging, Equity, Inclusion & Diversity Committee is to make ATCA an organization that welcomes critics from a wide range of life experiences and perspectives. We invest in training members in equity, diversity, and inclusion in order to critically serve underrepresented communities with culturally competent reviews of their work. This is a long-term effort.
The Committee was originally formed as the Diversity and Inclusion Committee in March 2018 by co-chairs Kelundra Smith and Martha Wade Steketee at the Intersections Summit hosted at Milwaukee Repertory Theatre in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In July 2020, the committee changed its name to the Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Committee under co-chairs David John Chávez and Kelundra Smith. In September 2021 the name was expanded again under new chair Karen Topham to the Belonging, Equity, Inclusion & Diversity Committee. In 2023 co-chairs Elizabeth Kramer and David John Chávez took the helm, and Kelundra Smith was named the chair of the Medina Prize subcommittee.
We are comprised of critics and numerous supporters and advisors across the country who share a passion for documenting the important work of our day.