About Our Founder

Dr. Hanan Hameen-Diagne, Ed.D., is an award-winning International Arts, Education, and Curriculum Expert, professor, curriculum developer, choreographer, and dance educator whose work lives at the intersection of performance, education, and cultural preservation. For more than four decades, she has shaped movement, sound, and story across stages, classrooms, and communities in the United States and abroad, choreographing for major recording artists and historic institutions including the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Radio City Music Hall, and Long Wharf Theatre, as well as cultural centers in Senegal and South Africa.

Grounded in both scholarship and practice, Dr. Hameen’s work extends beyond performance into education and community. As a professor, curriculum developer, and international educator, she has taught in public schools and universities, delivering credit-bearing courses, lectures, keynote addresses, and choreography that center culturally grounded, arts-based approaches to learning. Her research focuses on effective teaching methodologies for gifted and talented African diasporic students and on preparing educators to implement these practices.

A visionary cultural leader and institution builder, Dr. Hameen is the founder of the Artsucation™ Academy Network, Ms. Hanan’s Dance and Beyond, Keepers of the Culture Performing Arts Company, the New Haven Hip Hop Conference, the Official Juneteenth Coalition of Greater New Haven, the New Haven African Arts Alliance, and Lupie-Licious Fitness, and she serves as Artistic Director of the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) DanceAfrica Candle Bearers.

Currently, while living with Lupus, she choreographs for dance companies and theater productions, works as a dance educator, develops curriculum internationally for schools, organizations, and programs, mentors artists, teachers, and administrators, and and serves as an education consultant leading arts-based professional development focused on cultural relevance and sustainability. Her choreography connects ensembles through research, history, cultural significance, and arts education to deepen character and narrative onstage, while her global Artsucation™ programming and cultural exchange work continue to build community across the African Diaspora. She also provides Artsucation™ programming in the U.S. and across the African Diaspora through Cultural Exchange programs in Senegal and South Africa, and is a Mandela Washington Reciprocal Exchange alumna, 92nd Street Y Harkness Dance Center Dance Education Laboratory alumna, and recipient of the 2018 New Haven Arts Council Phenomenal Woman Award