Meet Jyoti.
Educator, author, founder.
I analyze and create media that make children culturally visible across educational resources and learning environments.
By changing the way we communicate, design, and learn and teach, we can build more thoughtful, respectful, and joyful learning environments in children’s homes, schools, media, and communities.
3-to-8-year olds are clear-eyed and brilliant. They are the reason why my work works.
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Different Differenter is an arts-and-crafts-based book with prompts and art activations for 3-8 year olds, and their grown ups. I crowdfunded it in 2016, and self-published in 2019.
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I noticed a wide gap in accessible and accurate resources on skin color for 3-8 year olds. At the time, I had already been studying it for 10+ years so I decided to give it a go!
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From educational resources to independent bookstores to children’s museums, Different Differenter serves audiences who care about social justice, identity, and children’s emotional well-being! (Details in bio below!)
First, skin color.
In 2012 TEDxWomen approached me!, for what would soon become my first public talk since 4th grade! It was still early days, I was asking good ‘disruptive questions, and getting noticed felt incredible.
There’s never one origin story of social justice and public engagement work. Click below to watch (2-3 mins) of one of mine.
Now, culture.
I’m now working on my 2nd children’s book, entitled, Yesterday, Nexterday! It builds on conversations around identity and children’s impression and expressions on the theme of culture.
View the short video and follow me on Instagram to see where the work is heading. Original frameworks, and resources for educators, program directors, and Edtech teams to follow, so stay tuned!
Rethinking Schools
McGraw Hills Wonders
The Juggernaut
Join Jyoti’s community!
Make art for literacy!
Access a free anti-bias, skin color-related activity for your class, art room, library, or home? Link below.
Want to book me?
I am available for speaking engagements at youth organizations, schools, and higher ed campuses.
Fill out this intake form. →
Are you an upstander!
Help grow the cultural visibility community. Amplify my work and introduce me to co-conspirators.
Email Jyoti →
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, museums, literary and cultural forums, 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 am the founder of The Colo(u)rism Project (2012), an independent initiative that has expanded into an inquiry into childhood and identity formation. I received an Individual Artists Grant from Houston Arts Alliance for Putting the U in Color, a month-long exhibit examining colorism within South Asian communities.
My professional experience spans visual communication, nonprofit leadership, and consulting, including The Economic Times, J. Walter Thompson, Asia Society Texas Center, and TiE Houston, where I served as Executive Director. I hold master’s degrees in Media Studies and Liberal Studies from The New School and CUNY Graduate Center, respectively, and a BFA in Applied Art (Visual Communication) from Delhi College of Art. I live in Washington Heights with my teenage son, who enjoys flute, writing, and designing aerospace video-game things.
