Tria Andrews

Biography

Tria Andrews is a Ph.D. candidate in the Ethnic Studies Department at the University of California, Berkeley and a graduate of the M.F.A. program in Fiction at San Diego State University. Her dissertation, “Education on the Reservation: Extracurricular and Culturally-Relevant Programing,” examines educational activities for youth on an Indian reservation from the founding of a boarding school in the late nineteenth century to the present day. The dissertation compares colonial education paradigms with the culturally-relevant curricula at tribally-run juvenile detention facility to ask how Native thinkers have moved beyond the programming to innovate tribal programs for youth. This research is informed by over seven years of tutoring and teaching yoga to incarcerated adolescents.

In addition to writing her dissertation, Tria is currently completing a collection of poetry, titled “Dead Center of the Heart.” This collection highlights the experiences of Native Americans and Filipinos as a result of American colonial policies and their legacies. Tria founded and co-facilitates the Race and Yoga Working Group through the Center for Race and Gender at UC Berkeley and teaches for Poetry for the People, Prison University Project, and University of San Francisco.