Karen Darricades is a Toronto-based artist, educator, writer, and award-winning youth worker with nearly two decades of experience engaging young people through art, media, and technology. She’s the founder and CEO of Lit Kit, where she designs STEM maker-kits that demystify media and tech for youth aged 13+, and is also the host of the #WeMakeMedia podcast. Karen serves as Head of Arts and Culture at Creative Commons Canada and leads countless workshops across schools, libraries, museums, and community hubs through her long-standing initiative, Never Gallery Ready.

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Karen’s mission is simple but profound: help young people understand how media is made so they can reclaim their digital worlds and future pathways. Her work lives at the intersection of art and STEM, community care and media literacy, healing and empowerment. Whether she’s teaching a hands-on workshop or challenging dominant narratives in public discourse, Karen builds spaces where creativity and critical thinking thrive—especially for those often overlooked by traditional systems.

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At the heart of her work is the belief that we get what we make. If we want a better world, we need to understand the tools shaping it. From empowering youth to speak back to toxic media messages, to helping them imagine bold futures beyond the status quo, Karen reminds us that knowledge is power—and that power belongs in the hands of young people.

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As a queer woman, a media-maker, and a lifelong advocate for self-defined womanhood, Karen speaks with honesty about the pressures women face from an early age and the trauma that often follows them into adulthood. Her workshops create room for reflection, post-traumatic growth, and redefining narratives on our own terms. For Karen, womanhood isn’t a fixed identity—it’s a living, evolving practice of radical self-love, solidarity, and choosing how we show up in the world.

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🎧 In this episode of Monthly Wednesdays with Nada, Karen shares her insights on media, identity, and reclaiming womanhood. She offers wisdom on how to flip the script, love ourselves by loving each other, and stay creative even when the world tells us to shrink.

 

Her message is clear:
"Give it time. Give yourself grace. You are magic. Just keep going."

- Karen Darricades​