Who She Is
I first came to know Letania Kirkland through the way she describes herself, a mama, a mover, and a wordsmith. That simple triad tells you a lot. It conjures a life lived in motion, a mind that listens, and a heart that writes. She is Los Angeles based, shaped by both the rigor of dance and the generosity of yoga, and guided by a voice that cares as much about community as it does about craft. Her work lives at the intersection of body, breath, and storytelling, and it is at that crossroads that she invites people to meet her.
Origins and Training
Letania trained in ballet and modern dance as a young artist, then studied dance at UC Berkeley. The imprint of that training is unmistakable. Her classes carry the clarity of a barre and the freedom of a release. You can feel the lineage of modern technique in her attention to weight and spirals, the ballet in her quiet devotion to alignment. There is patience, the kind that looks like plies done again and again until they become prayer.
In her mid twenties, she completed yoga teacher training at Laughing Lotus in 2006. That moment widened the road. Teaching became a calling, and yoga offered another language to speak about flow, structure, and breath. She would go on to teach in New York and Los Angeles, building a practice that respects tradition but refuses to be static.
From Stage to Studio
Letania is a dancer turned movement educator, but the dancer remains. She teaches with choreography in her hands, nuance in the small muscles of the face, and a performer’s sense of timing. Over time, that performance instinct evolved into community practice. She founded Process, also known as Process Studio, a home base for movement in Los Angeles. Process is aptly named. It centers the journey of learning, the building of trust with one’s body, and the honesty of showing up as you are.
In classes, she combines asana with subtle voice and rhythm work. She teaches attention to transitions, the quiet spaces between shapes, the way breath leads and follows. The studio work is grounded and playful. Her students come from different paths, and yet the room feels like one family, equal parts sweat and laughter.
Writing Of Many Worlds
Writing runs parallel to her teaching. On her blog and Substack, Of Many Worlds, she publishes essays that read like intimate postcards from daily life. They touch motherhood, race, education, movement, and the tender politics of neighborhood. Her writing carries a clear voice, a poet’s eye for detail, and a precise ear for cadence. She does not sermonize. She tells a story and lets your body catch up to its meaning.
I have noticed how she writes with the same care she brings to a class, building paragraphs that breathe, stacking images like blocks, then letting them topple into something true. There is often a gentle pivot at the end, a poem’s turn. She is not trying to be a brand. She is trying to be a person who pays attention.
Community Roots in Los Angeles
Letania’s work belongs to the city in ways that feel sincere and rooted. She has shown up as a parent volunteer, joining neighbors to honor and support teachers and students. When she speaks about community, she sounds like someone who believes in the slow power of showing up, the way small acts become echoes. She writes about local life, teaches in parks as well as studios, and treats the civic as personal, because in practice it is.
There is a through line here. Dance taught discipline, yoga taught presence, organizing taught patience. The three together form a braid, a way of living where art and citizenship keep each other honest.
Family: Partnership and Parenthood
In public life, Letania is known as the long time partner of actor and playwright Roger Guenveur Smith. Together they are parents of three children. She writes about motherhood with tenderness and humor, sharing glimpses without surrendering privacy. One name appears in her own words, Zora Pearl, a luminous moniker that reads like a lyric. The other children remain largely unnamed in her public writing, which feels intentional. Sometimes love is best expressed by keeping the circle small.
Roger’s artistic world often intersects with hers. They have been photographed at festivals and honors, stepping onto carpets side by side. That visibility belongs more to his industry, yet it offers a snapshot of their shared life, walking into rooms as partners, walking out with their own story intact. Roger’s earlier marriage is part of his family history, another branch on the tree, but the trunk here is the home they have built and the children they are raising.
Presence and Practice
What stands out now is continuity. Letania still teaches, still writes, still builds. Process Studio continues to serve as a hub for movement and community. She offers classes that meet people where they are, inviting beginners and seasoned practitioners into the same field. On any given week, she might post a reflection, plan a workshop, and polish a sequence, balancing parenting and teaching with the careful timekeeping of a musician.
Her practice shines in small decisions. A slower inhale. A cue that lands at the right moment. A willingness to adapt a plan for the room that appears. She knows that transformation starts quietly, then compounds. If movement is a conversation, she is fluent, and she speaks with kindness.
Timeline Highlights
Early years brought ballet and modern training, seeds that would never stop germinating. University study deepened the practice, giving her the intellectual architecture to match an embodied craft. In 2006, the Laughing Lotus teacher training marked a portal, a pivot into the role of mentor and guide. The late 2000s and 2010s saw consistent teaching across New York and Los Angeles, with class rosters that reflect the city’s breadth.
Around that time, her blog began and persisted, offering year by year a record of care and curiosity. The founding of Process stitched those threads into a home, and appearances with Roger at cultural events drew a wider circle around their shared life. Through it all, the most important timeline has been the quiet one, the morning rituals, the repeated devotion to craft and family.
What Her Work Feels Like
In Letania’s world, movement is not spectacle, it is language. She approaches a class the way a gardener approaches soil, turning it, watering it, trusting that something will grow if tended. She writes as if placing stones across a stream, careful and surefooted, making a path that others can cross. Watching her teach feels like watching someone conduct a small orchestra, each breath a note, each posture a phrase.
I think of her work as a soft drumbeat, steady and low, a rhythm that makes a room calmer and braver. It is built for daily life, not only for performance, resilient enough to hold grief, playful enough to sustain joy.
FAQ
Who is Letania Kirkland
She is a Los Angeles based movement teacher, writer, and community organizer with a background in ballet and modern dance. She trained as a yoga teacher in 2006 and has taught for many years in New York and Los Angeles. She is the founder of Process Studio and the author of the blog and Substack Of Many Worlds.
What is Process Studio
Process Studio is a community oriented movement space founded by Letania. It focuses on accessible practice, creative sequencing, and the social life of learning, inviting students to experience yoga and movement as a lived process rather than a product.
How many children do Letania and Roger have
They are parents of three children. Letania writes about motherhood with warmth while keeping her family’s privacy intact. One child’s name, Zora Pearl, appears in her own writing, while the others are not widely publicized.
Is she married to Roger Guenveur Smith
Public descriptions vary between partner and wife. What matters more in her own telling is the partnership itself, the shared work of parenting and the mutual respect across their artistic lives.
Where did she train
She trained in ballet and modern dance from a young age, studied dance at UC Berkeley, and completed yoga teacher training at Laughing Lotus in 2006. These strands inform her teaching, which blends technique, breath, and embodied storytelling.
What does she write about
Her blog and Substack feature essays about motherhood, race, education, movement, and the meaning of community. She writes with clarity and care, often weaving personal narrative with reflection.
Where does she teach
She has taught in both New York and Los Angeles, in studios, parks, and community spaces. Process Studio serves as a home base, and her offerings include classes, workshops, and private sessions.
What makes her teaching distinct
She bridges dance and yoga, pairing alignment with flow, and technique with creativity. Her cues are musical, her sequencing intentional, and her rooms inclusive. Above all, she treats practice as conversation, not command.
