DRU
Drisana “Dru” McDaniel (she/her)
I am a mother-worker-activist living in Summerville, South Carolina with my two daughters. My adult son lives in Atlanta, Georgia.
I consider myself a doer of womanist work, and I land on the womanist historical continuum as a third-wave womanist thinker, committed to addressing oppressions experienced by all people – but especially black, honoring multiple ways of knowing, and “striving to stay grounded in notions of possibility, hope, and change that enhance optimal living that transcends from survival to thriving.” I am focused on how liberatory practices work to disrupt supremacist power -- that is, how we assert our power to create what we want while refusing powerless identities and choosing to focus on achieving wholeness, self-definition, and collective well-being.
My higher education journey began in community college. I later graduated from the College of Charleston, where I received my B.A. in Women and Gender Studies and studied Sociology. I currently study Women, Gender, Spirituality, and Social Justice at the California Institute of Integral Studies. I belong to a POC working research group focused on contemplative social science and qualitative inquiry.
My work is focused on social injustice, racialized dimensions of trauma, the psychospiritual path, resilience, and capacity. With my practice, I attend to the nitty-gritty of individual and collective experiences, and I envision transformational justice as the fruit of contemplation and action. I have a passion for public speaking, and I am most hopeful about what can happen when we explore our radical interconnectedness and realize healing together.
I am also the Race equity and Justice Facilitator for Keecha Harris and Associates -- a Black woman-owned boutique consulting firm that leads organizational development, project management, and research and evaluation projects for publicly and privately funded efforts across a broad range of topics. With KHA, I develop transformational curriculum, design processes for client engagements, present at national conferences, and support individuals and organizations as a qualified administrator of the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI), a globally recognized assessment tool designed to assess and build intercultural competence.
I have been a member of the Transformative Teaching Collective since 2014, where I provide support for groups with gatherings that focus on intergroup dialogue, social justice education, empathy, the practice of nonviolence, healing, and collaboration.
I consider myself a doer of womanist work, and I land on the womanist historical continuum as a third-wave womanist thinker, committed to addressing oppressions experienced by all people – but especially black, honoring multiple ways of knowing, and “striving to stay grounded in notions of possibility, hope, and change that enhance optimal living that transcends from survival to thriving.” I am focused on how liberatory practices work to disrupt supremacist power -- that is, how we assert our power to create what we want while refusing powerless identities and choosing to focus on achieving wholeness, self-definition, and collective well-being.
My higher education journey began in community college. I later graduated from the College of Charleston, where I received my B.A. in Women and Gender Studies and studied Sociology. I currently study Women, Gender, Spirituality, and Social Justice at the California Institute of Integral Studies. I belong to a POC working research group focused on contemplative social science and qualitative inquiry.
My work is focused on social injustice, racialized dimensions of trauma, the psychospiritual path, resilience, and capacity. With my practice, I attend to the nitty-gritty of individual and collective experiences, and I envision transformational justice as the fruit of contemplation and action. I have a passion for public speaking, and I am most hopeful about what can happen when we explore our radical interconnectedness and realize healing together.
I am also the Race equity and Justice Facilitator for Keecha Harris and Associates -- a Black woman-owned boutique consulting firm that leads organizational development, project management, and research and evaluation projects for publicly and privately funded efforts across a broad range of topics. With KHA, I develop transformational curriculum, design processes for client engagements, present at national conferences, and support individuals and organizations as a qualified administrator of the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI), a globally recognized assessment tool designed to assess and build intercultural competence.
I have been a member of the Transformative Teaching Collective since 2014, where I provide support for groups with gatherings that focus on intergroup dialogue, social justice education, empathy, the practice of nonviolence, healing, and collaboration.