Research & Teaching
Innovation
“I have devoted quite some time as a change agent and a disruptor within the Public Health field. I have amplified poetry as a tool of inquiry and analysis. I now look forward to co-conjuring bigger transdisciplinary and undisciplined visions with and for Black girls and Black gender-expansive youth.”
Participatory Narrative Analysis
Since 2010, I have honed a method of qualitative data analysis which I have coined and published about called “participatory narrative analysis.” After engaging research participants in ethnographic interviews, I will invite them back into the research space now as co-analysts of their own data. We read interview transcripts together, come up with main themes, and then engage in writing “research poetry” and “interpretive poetry,” as detailed in the following publications. This participatory narrative analysis has flourished with the collaboration of youth, young adult, and adult ally co-conspirators at the East Oakland Youth Development Center (EOYDC), Queer Crossings Project, and Kings Against Violence Initiative (KAVI).
- “Don’t Let Nobody Bring You Down”: How Urban Black Girls Write and Learn from Ethnographically-based Poetry to Understand and Heal from Relationship Violence.” Co-authored with Bianca Rivera and Shavaun Sutton. The Ethnographic Edge, 2(1), 57-65. 2018.
- “Son of the Soil…Daughters of the Land”: poetry writing as a strategy of citizen-making for lesbian, gay, and bisexual migrants and asylum seekers in Johannesburg.” Co-authored with Jo Vearey, Elsa Oliveira, and Gabriela Martínez Castillo. Agenda, 30(1), 85-95. 2016.
- “Poetic Justice: Engaging in Participatory Narrative Analysis to Find Solace in the “Killer Corridor.”” American Journal of Community Psychology, 55(1), 128-135. 2015.
- “Extreme Data Reduction: The Case for the Research Tanka.” Co-authored with Rich Furman. Journal of Poetry Therapy, 2(1), 43-52. 2015.
- “Poetry Therapy, Men, and Masculinities.” Co-authored with Rich Furman. Arts in Psychotherapy, 39(2): 102-106. 2012.
- “Inscriptive Restorations.” American Journal of Public Health, 102(7): e6. 2012.
- Y U Gotta Call It Ghetto? Co-authored with the My Identity is Community (MiC) Collective. Oakland, CA: Urban Diligence Press.
#CrunkPublicHealth
Since 2014, I have coined and been engaging in a praxis that I call “#CrunkPublicHealth,” which gives a nod (or a Bankhead Bounce) to my time learning and playing in the ATL. Through transdisciplinary and oftentimes undisciplined pedagogies, theories, and methodologies, #CrunkPublicHealth seeks to disrupt the hegemony in the Public Health field. I encourage others who embody an unapologetically decolonial feminist praxis betwixt and between Public Health to use the term and hashtag of #CrunkPublicHealth…just be sure to #CiteBlackWomen, particularly this Black woman!
A book chapter on my Crunk pedagogy and praxis will be published soon in a volume lovingly co-edited by Drs. Jillian Ford and Nathalia Jaramillo. For more details on this approach, check out the following publications and conversations:
- “#CrunkPublicHealth: Decolonial Feminist praxes of cultivating liberatory and transdisciplinary learning, research, and action spaces.” In J. Ford & N. Jaramillo (Eds.), Unsettling Colonialist Pedagogies. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press. Forthcoming.
- “Poetic Health Justice Forum.” With Tameka Cage Conley, Joseph Capeheart, Matteo Perez Lara, and Ryan Petteway. University of Pittsburgh Center for Health Equity and The Block Chronicles.
- “I Am Not Your Data, PT.I: Poetry as Praxis + Illumination for a Public Health of Resistance + Healing.” With Ryan Petteway and Walidah Imarisha. OHSU-PSU School of Public Health.
- “Inside My #CrunkPublicHealth Praxis.” Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Spelman College, Atlanta, GA. 2018.
- “#CrunkPublicHealth: Decolonial Black Feminist and Progressive Pedagogies of cultivating liberatory learning, research, and action spaces.” American Public Health Association Annual Meeting, Atlanta, GA. 2017.
Centering Wellness
In 2016, I developed a course called “Centering Wellness” that I taught at the Master’s level in the Spring of 2017. Through the course, students and I read and analyzed Black women’s literature with themes related to violence, trauma, illness, hope, healing, and wellness. We observed, engaged with, and created art as maps of our wellness journeys and commitments. We created affirmations, meditations, dances, blogs, and collages. We were pushed out of our comfort zones, then we pushed back against the confined boxes of Public Health. We began to happily color outside of the lines! Centering Wellness soon became a sought-after framework for health educators, yogis, choreographers, and creative writers. Since then, I have realized the Centering Wellness is much more than a course, but it is a pedagogy and a praxis. Also, through Centering Wellness, I have been inspired to deepen my practice and facilitation around mindfulness, and in 2021, I became certified as a meditation instructor through MNDFL’s Certification & Training Program. I look forward to holding space using contemplative practices for broader audiences. For more details about Centering Wellness, please refer to the following conversations and publications:
- “Mindfulness and Meditation.” I AM GPH Podcast. New York University School of Global Public Health. 2019.
- “Centering Wellness: Using Black Feminist literature as a Public Health pedagogical tool for personal healing, community health, and social justice.” In: A. J. Santella (Ed.), Master of Public Health Competencies: A Case Study Approach(pp. 45-52). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning. 2019.
- “Centering Wellness: Using Literature and Writing as Pedagogical Tools for Personal Healing, Community Health and Social Justice.” Hip Hop Literacies Conference. New York, NY. 2017.
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Dr. LeConté J. Dill