Tasha Golden

Tasha Golden, PhD is Director of Research at the International Arts + Mind Lab at Johns Hopkins University, and a national leader and consultant in arts + public health. A public health scientist who used to be a touring songwriter, Golden studies impacts of the arts, music, aesthetics, and creativity on health and well-being. She holds a PhD in Public Health Sciences, and has served as an advisor on several national and international health initiatives. She's published extensively on intersections of creativity and the arts with wellbeing, and is adjunct faculty for the University of Florida’s Center for Arts in Medicine. She recently led the pilot evaluation of CultureRx in Massachusetts: the first arts-on-prescription model in the U.S.

As singer-songwriter for the critically acclaimed band Ellery, Golden toured full-time in the US and abroad, and her songs appear in feature films and TV dramas (ABC, SHOWTIME, FOX, NETFLIX, etc). She is a published poet (Humanist Press) and founder of Project Uncaged: an arts-based health intervention for incarcerated teen women that amplifies their voices in community and political discourses.

Golden’s diverse background drives her success as an international speaker and thought leader. She gives dynamic talks and facilitates workshops for artists, businesses, researchers, practitioners, and more—helping them enhance and reimagine their work. As a consultant, she helps leaders and organizations draw on the science of “arts and health” to further their goals.

As a public health researcher and innovator, Dr. Tasha Golden's work regularly asks, "What do we not know?" as a means of identifying whose voices, ideas, cultures, or experiences are excluded in a given project, AND how exclusions may be affecting project data or plans. She gets audiences thinking creatively about how inclusivity not only advances equity, but also fundamentally expands what we're able to know, do, and change.

"Without new, creative approaches, our data may not be incorrect, but they will be incomplete. They may not be inaccurate, but they will be inadequate."

Dr. Golden has recently presented and consulted for the national “Creating Healthy Communities” Initiative (UF + ArtPlace America), Grantmakers in Health, the Trust for Public Land, and POLITICO’s 2019 Annual Health Care Summit in Amsterdam. She's sought to present and provoke new ideas, and to help organizations develop innovative strategies that further their goals.

Golden specializes in theorizing future and/or population-level implications of new research or products, including implications related to equity and power, and she uniquely wraps studies of culture and social discourses into the advancement of health and human thriving. Her own research has generated new methods for studying sensitive topics (such as violence) among vulnerable populations (such as minors).

Golden’s visionary work is bolstered by her multidisciplinary training--music, writing, rhetoric, health--and by her career as an artist and entrepreneur. Golden toured full-time as singer-songwriter for the critically acclaimed band Ellery, and her songs have been in feature films and TV dramas. She is also the founder of Project Uncaged: an arts-based health intervention for incarcerated teen women that amplifies their voices in health and justice advocacy. (projectuncaged.org)

Holding a PhD in Public Health Sciences, Golden draws on her diverse background to stimulate and develop new ideas, partnerships, products, and frameworks that optimize well-being, equity, knowledge, and communications.

As a public health researcher and innovator, Dr. Tasha Golden studies the impacts of environments, arts, sociocultural discourses, and aesthetics on health equity, research, and practice. She's recently presented and consulted for the national “Creating Healthy Communities” Initiative (UF + ArtPlace America), Grantmakers in Health, the Trust for Public Land, and POLITICO’s 2019 Annual Health Care Summit in Amsterdam.

Dr. Golden is sought internationally to present and provoke new ideas, and she helps organizations develop innovative strategies that further their goals. Centering health equity and public mental health, her own research has generated new approaches to study design and project development.

Dr. Golden specializes in theorizing future and/or population-level implications of new research or products, and she uniquely wraps studies of culture and social discourses into the advancement of health and human thriving.

Golden’s visionary work is bolstered by her multidisciplinary training--music, writing, rhetoric, health--and by her career as an artist and entrepreneur. Golden toured full-time as singer-songwriter for the critically acclaimed band Ellery, and her songs have been in feature films and TV dramas. She is a published poet and the founder of Project Uncaged: an arts-based health intervention for incarcerated teen women that amplifies their voices in health and justice advocacy. (projectuncaged.org)

Holding a PhD in Public Health Sciences, Golden draws on her diverse background to stimulate and develop innovative ideas, partnerships, products, and frameworks that optimize well-being, equity, and communications.