Challenging Racism & Theatre

Theatre plays a vital role in our community as one of the most powerful platforms for storytelling and amplifying the voices of the unheard and unseen. Theatre can touch an audience, help us see through a different lens, and compel us to endure messages that make us uncomfortable. As theatre brings truths to the surface, it can also create safe spaces that enable meaningful connection and lessons that can empower and activate members of our community.

Challenging Racism partners regularly with arts organizations. In March 2023, Challenging Racism worked with Educational Theatre Company and AHC Housing Arlington to produce and present Devising Hope, an original Reader’s Theatre play based on the collected stories of Arlington Housing residents. Participants met to discuss and share stories about the history and systems of structural racism in Arlington County. Using housing as an example of a system in which inequity and structural racism are found, Participants told stories about the neighborhoods in which they grew up, schools they attended, experiences of racism in employment and travel, families and friends. Heartfelt stories were shared, recorded, and presented to a packed house of supporters, officials, executives, and friends. Challenging Racism facilitator, Dawn Kyser, moderated an audience talk-back following the performance and met with Participants each week to discuss concepts around privilege, bias and equity, and to facilitate conversation in which stories were heard and shared.

Download the 2025 Challenging Racism Theatre Brief