Meet Jyoti.
Educator, author, founder.
I study and find ways to make children and their families culturally visible across children’s programming, education, and media.
My work began with studying skin color!
The same year I officially founded The Colo(u)rism Project, TEDxWomen approached me for what became my first public talk since 5th grade!
That was 2012.
I’ve continued to challenge dominant culture and find ways to use the extraordinary power of culture work in bringing about social change. The focus of my praxis changed to children and their adults.
Click below to watch the story that shaped my independent work.
Children are clear-eyed thinkers with a vision for the future. They are the reason my work works.
My work and words as seen in
Skin color led to deeper conversations.
Writing a book about skin color, hundreds of journal articles and even more candid conversations later, came questions around culture.
My 2nd book, Yesterday, Nexterday: An Activity Book about Culture is grounded in the belief that children do not simply inherit culture. They actively interpret, repurpose, and create new ways to think about it! We can listen and articulate their views through play, art, and media literacy pedagogies and participatory practices.
Listen to my pitch about this book in a short, 3-min video.
Join me in making a bigger tent.
Check out my past work!
Access a free skin color-related activity for your PD, leadership cohort, class, art room, library, afterschool program, or home.
Book an interactive talk?
I am available for speaking engagements at youth organizations, schools, and higher ed campuses. Even leadership of color cohorts!
Cultural Visibility convos!
Have questions or engage in cultural visibility work? Amplify my work, collaborate, or introduce me to co-conspirators.
Email Me →
I am an Indian-born, New York–based scholar-practitioner, writer, and educator focused on engaging children, youth, and their grown-ups on discourse around cultural visibility.
I have facilitated workshops and public conversations in schools, universities, social justice organizations, and thought leadership spaces including at TEDxWomen and the Jaipur Literature Festival. My work and commentary have appeared in Bitch! Media, The Washington Post, The Juggernaut, and Radio Free Brooklyn. My first children’s book, Different Differenter: An Activity Book about Skin Color (2019), has been included as an educational resource by The New York Times Wirecutter, Rethinking Schools, Social Justice Books, and McGraw Hill Wonders.
I founded The Colo(u)rism Project in 2012, an independent initiative that has since expanded into an inquiry into childhood and identity. My first public engagement work, Putting the U in Color, a month-long art and media exhibit examining colorism within South Asian communities, was funded by an Houston Arts Alliance via the City of Houston.
Prior to going independent in 2012, I worked in advertising, nonprofit leadership, and consulting. Starting as an intern with J. Walter Thompson, a stint at McCann Erickson, and ending with TiE Houston, where I served as Executive Director. I’ve done creative projects with nonprofits, including Breakthrough NYC, and Asia Society Texas Center.
I hold master’s degrees in Media Studies and Liberal Studies from The New School and CUNY Graduate Center and a BFA in Applied Art (Visual Communication) from College of Art Delhi.