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*This Letter Has Received No Response from the Iyengar National Association of the United States.

 

 

June 11, 2020

 

To: Randy Just, Scott Hobbs, Nina Pileggi, Susan Bullington, Susan Goulet, Michelle Pontrelli, Stephen Weiss, Michele Galen, Paige Noon, David Carpenter, Denise Rowe, Holly Walck Kostura, Amita Bhagat, Jean Stawarz, Gwendolyn Derk, and the IYNAUS Board and Staff:

 

As members of the yoga and mindfulness communities, we write to you today to urge you to address the longstanding history of anti-Blackness and racism in the Iyengar Association of the United States of America and its regional chapters.

 

For more than a decade, concerned members of Iyengar National Association of the United States have communicated their serious concerns to you about the organization’s history of racist and oppressive practices. IYNAUS members have written articles for Yoga Samachar and the regional chapter newsletters. They have organized events and trainings, and created working papers on racial justice. In response, IYNAUS has ignored, demeaned, and silenced Black members and directly instructed them not to share their recommendations. Many of these racialized interactions have been documented in writing and witnessed by Board members and senior teachers who have chosen to remain silent. You have made a practice of not inviting Black members to participate at the planning or leadership level of IYNAUS, even as they represent the embodied intelligence that IYNAUS most needs. Additionally, the Iyengar teacher training manual features one recently added and derivative section drawn from common diversity templates.

 

IYNAUS's anti-Blackness and ongoing disavowal of its responsibility to address white privilege and to provide equitable instruction and support to all its students and teachers, regardless of race, ethnicity, or background, has been itself a repeatedly reaffirmed and re-enacted choice.

 

Only when an institution can honestly and transparently reflect on its historical and current lack of inclusivity do insight and change become possible. Collectively, we ask IYNAUS to:

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•  Hire an external auditor with situated and embodied knowledge of anti-Blackness and its traumatic effects to examine IYNAUS and all its chapters with respect to its record of implicit and explicit racism and its failure to set and attain meaningful inclusivity and equity goals

•  Release audit results with complete transparency to its members and make the results publicly accessible on your website. Information should include but not be limited to:

  • How many IYNAUS Board Members and Committee Members are Black, and what percentage of the total does this constitute?

  • How many identify as non-Black POC (and percentage)?

  • How many are white (and percentage)?

  • How many senior teachers of the Iyengar method in the United States are Black? How many are non-Black POC? How many are white?

  • How many IYNAUS members are Black, and what percentage of the total does this constitute?

• What are the motives and benefits for IYNAUS’s near-exclusive whiteness?

• How many times have Black or non-Black People of Color raised, in voice or in writing, the issue of IYNAUS’s lack of inclusivity and equity and how have you responded to their concerns?

• What experiences of racism, marginalization, and exclusion do Black and non-Black People of Color report about their engagements with Iyengar yoga in the USA?

 

We call for the resignation of all members of the IYNAUS leadership, including at the level of the regional chapters, who have made inflammatory or racist responses to Black teachers laboring on committees for free and endeavoring to express directly their concerns about systemic racism within the structure of IYNAUS. We also call for the resignation of IYNAUS leadership who have avoided direct action to correct the organization’s history of racial injustice, and who have not sought to minimize the harm they have caused.

 

We call for you to lay out a plan to abolish the IYNAUS leadership, certification, and “grooming” structures that reinforce anti-Blackness and racism in IYNAUS.

 

We ask that you examine and openly acknowledge the specific ways that IYNAUS, its teaching practices, and studio culture exacerbate the racial trauma that Black and non-Black People of Color experience.

 

We ask that you begin the process of restorative justice and reparative action. Restorative justice includes a plan for how IYNAUS and its chapters will redress the harm it has caused, and devote significant resources to prevent the racial traumatization of Black and POC students and teachers in the future. Restorative justice requires immediate structural changes that show your commitment to racial justice in measurable ways that Black and non-Black People of Color and their communities can tangibly feel.

 

This would include but not be limited to the following:

 

• Detailed apology to Black and non-Black People of Color communities that IYNAUS has harmed, excluded, dismissed, exploited for free labor, and demeaned explicitly and implicitly.

• Written acknowledgment (permanently installed on the IYNAUS and chapter websites) of the history of yoga and cultural appropriation in the West

• Written acknowledgment (permanently installed on the IYNAUS and chapter websites) indicating IYNAUS’s commitment to ongoing anti-racism work

• Carry out a full review of how Iyengar yoga’s teaching methods and materials, fee structures, and “grooming” culture promote white privilege, anti-Black racism, and the traumatization and exclusion of Black and non-Black People of Color.

• Commit to seeking and contracting ongoing social justice supervision from Black and non-Black People of Color

• Amend the standards for certification and teacher training to include anti-racism work

• Commit to an ongoing and non-ending process of repair that includes the following actions:

  • Establish an Inclusion and Equity Officer position as part of the national board, to be filled by a member from the BIPOC community, with a proven track record of social justice, and with power to audit the organization and implement structural change

  • Make ongoing monthly donations in perpetuity to organizations that combat anti-Blackness and racism (such as the BLM movement) and that support the well-being of Black communities

  • Invest a portion of monthly income from dues to support Black-owned businesses

  • Give scholarships to students from BIPOC communities

  • Create a mentoring network for students from BIPOC communities that is paid and resourced by IYNAUS

  • Open regular feedback forums in which IYNAUS can be held accountable for making concrete progress in racial justice and restorative justice

  • Establish a Grievance Committee with an outside overseer

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We believe that this is an opportunity for rapprochement between IYNAUS, its chapters, its membership, its students, and the world at large. Moreover, we know that without the work of truth and redress there can be no reconciliation. We remain hopeful that at this time in history, IYNAUS will honor its moral, ethical, and practical obligations.

 

We request your timely response outlining the actions IYNAUS pledges to undertake.

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Sincerely,

 

Kris Manjapra, Ph.D., CIYT

Bo Forbes, Psy.D., E-RYT500, YACEP, Boston, MA.

Zeenat Potia, M.A., mindfulness teacher, Cambridge Insight Meditation Center

Zabie Yamasaki, M.Ed., RYT, Founder, Transcending Sexual Trauma Through Yoga

Annie Hoffman, CIYT, IYANE Committee Member

Joanne Lougheed

Nicole Quibodeaux, E-RYT500, Orange County

Jess Z Hicks, E-RYT200, M.Ed., Boston

Niyati Shah, E-RYT500, Washington, D.C.

Taylor White Moffitt

Christie Roe, E-RYT500, New York City

Cassie Jackson

Charlotte Sahyoun, RYT500, Wellesley, MA.

Anuradha Bhagwati, RYT500, MPP, author and activist

Stephanie Leger, E-RYT, Orange County, CA

Kristen Fabiszewski, RYT, Torrance, CA

Kathryn Boland, MA, CYT-500, R-DMT

Cora Geroux, E-RYT500, YACEP, Sydney, Australia

Giusep Michelle Vitale, M.S., RYT-200, Providence, Rhode Island

Sandra Nicht, M.S. Yoga Therapy, C-IAYT, AYT-NAMA, E-RYT500, Baltimore, Maryland

Jacoby Ballard, RYT500, YACEP, Salt Lake City

Katherine Hartsell, PTA, Boston, MA

Mariah-Muriel Dee Appleton

Meghann Hogan

Pamela Esty

Jill Edwards Minye

Leslie Ellis, C-IAYT, E-RYT500, YACEP, Bend, Oregon

Yonnie Fung

Sunny Wilson

Alex Auder

Lauren Dahl

Matthew Remski, RYT-500, YACEP, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Melissa Alexis, MFA, CYT, Boston, MA.

Elizabeth Gallo, E-RYT, YACEP, MFA, Evanston, IL.

Jamie Hanson, E-RYT500, YACEP, San Clemente, CA

Carolyn Little, M.A., E-RYT500, Boston, MA.

Kate Lynch

Julia Ruth Dillon, RYT5, Westfield, NJ

Marena Jones, RYT, Maine, U.S.

Celine Bal

Pamela Newman

Mischa Telford

Nancy Worlock

Stephanie Rogers, RYT, RPE, RCST

Ann Tapsell West

Winter Skyberg, RYT200, Newberg, Oregon

Kasey Stewart, RYT200, CYT500, Portland, OR

Ashly Fox, B.S., CADC-1A, RYT500, YTRx, San Clemente, CA

Cynthia Buenzli Gertz, Amery, WI.

Liv Gold, PT, DPT, RYT200, Boston, MA.

Sandy Kalik, E-RYT500, Boston, MA.

Liz Eisman, LMT, E-RYT200, Portland, Oregon

Vittoria Frua, RYT, Milan, Italy

Christine Wushke, C-IAYT, RYT, RYS500, YACEP< Okotoks, Canada

Claire Kelley, M.A., MPH, E-RYT500, Tucson, AZ

Joanna Colwell

Tiffany Kieran

Angela Gollat

Trina Altman, E-RYT500, YACEP, Los Angeles, CA.

Chris Clancy, E-RYT500, Vancouver, Canada

Gerri Penny,

Jo Schneiderman

Heather Morton

Sandy Blaine

Vincent Copeland

Dalia Yoga,

Seti Tzu

Tracy Silberer

Charlotte Bell

Maria Luisa Basualdo

Meme Campbell

Heba Mahoud

K. Moo King-Curtis

Donna Noble

Kim Nicol

Rebecca Busler

Patricia K. Holder

Sheila Cheong

Elisa La Strega

Robin Simmonds

Donna Farhi

Janice Vien

Ann Socha

Julie Adler

Jane Sleven

Roberta McCarty DellAnno

Magdalena Weistein-Comen

Yasmin Lambat, Somatic Educator and Yoga Therapist

Anna Kelchlin, CIYT

Yenkuei Chuang

Anne O'Connor, CIYT, Williamstown, MA