Em Daniels

Biography

I am a field researcher at the intersection of education, corrections, criminal legal reform, and abolition.  I am compelled to ground my work in what I hear from community groups and impacted people and families, as well as learning from a wide variety of thinkers, activists, mystics, practitioners, and healers.  I believe our shared experiences can bring us to as much understanding of the world as other types of research and exploration.

My first text begins the conversation about bringing joy into adult learning spaces, and that is the direction my thinking and learning are moving.  I have observed and experienced joy as an antidote to some of the impacts of trauma, but have much more to learn.  I am also curious how we can bring joy into challenging spaces, especially carceral classrooms, and what that can mean for learners.  For myself, I am considering the question “How do we engage imagination and wonder as an entrance to creating our lives, and not only as an escape from difficult circumstances?”

Education

BA Communications, UNC-Charlotte, 2003
MST, Portland State University, 2006

Areas of Research / Professional Expertise

My research and expertise focus on countering the impacts of trauma on adult learning by expanding beyond a mental health approach and defining multiple points of entry to the work.  This approach is grounded in the necessity of addressing individual and systemic trauma as crucial to create and sustain a just and compassionate world.

I come to this work from a non-traditional academic background that began in community based organizations and programs and progressed through an enormous variety of teaching and learning experiences.  My master’s work focused on the intersections of conflict and education and I originally framed my thinking through a broad lens of peace activism.  When I began teaching in prison, however, my focus began to narrow as I learned about the system of mass incarceration and the people and communities held in its grip.

That focus narrowed even more during my work as a reentry education navigator.  Helping people impacted by mass incarceration navigate educational bureaucracy in an unkind institution led me to research on trauma, institutionalization, and the impacts of incarceration on adult learning.  I closely examined the web of connection between education, racism, poverty, incarceration, unaddressed and unresolved trauma, intergenerational lack of access to resources, and systemic oppression in an effort to help staff and faculty better understand the barriers facing re-entering students.

My hope is that my contribution to this work, to this field, will join an emergent conversation - profound and wide-ranging - about how we treat each other, and how we treat ourselves.

Personal Interests

I have been an artist and social dancer for many years.  My preferred artistic media are watercolor and ink/line drawing, and my dancing is usually salsa, bachata, cha cha, and merengue, although I'll try dancing to anything.  I dabble in all kinds of reading but don't write much outside of the professional realm.  I love love love sharing learning spaces, regardless of topic, and often combine art and music with facilitation.

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