Sarah Hentges,
PhD, E-RYT-200, YACEP
Professor of Transdisciplinary Cultural Studies at the University of Maine at Augusta
Founder, The Spiral Goddess Collective
Owner, Spiral Studio
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American yoga is often (mis)understood as elitist and exclusionary—as a pursuit of fitness practiced by bendable, beautiful bodies. It is commodified and marketed as a variety of expensive brands and disposable trends. The focus on the physical overshadows yoga’s elements of conscious breath, mindful meditation, deep philosophy, and transformative healing. Or, yoga is assumed to be a religious practice, or just a bunch of stretching, or unfettered appropriation. Despite its popularity in the U.S., we are mostly unaware of yoga’s ancient roots as well as its contemporary applications.
Drawing from her experience as a professor and yoga teacher, the author of this book explores the marginalized, feminist, queer, grassroots, underground, interconnected, creative, innovative, and somatic elements of yoga that engage so many of us. The author offers exploratory embodied practices, mines diverse sources, and asks critical questions about identity, culture, and power. She asks us to consider what American yoga has to offer our individual and collective future and how we can leverage embodied practices toward transformation, on and off of our yoga mats. |
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Educate. Embody. Empower.
Sarah's work has always been wide-ranging, eclectic, and transdisciplinary. In 2013 she started using the term "Culture & Movement" and the tagline "Move and Be Moved" to describe her evolving work.
In 2022 she created The Spiral Goddess Collective, a Center for Mind/Body Movement and the Spiral Goddess Collective Care Fund (SGCCF) scholarship program to amplify the work she has been doing through her work as a professor for more than a decade—offering free yoga and dance classes, workshops, and retreats to the greater Bangor community—because she believes that we are more powerful when we are connected, when we lift each other up, and when we hold space for the healing and transformation of ourselves as well as others.
In 2025, the downtown Bangor space for The Spiral Goddess Collective was rebranded and transformed into Spiral Studio. Spiral Studio is Sarah's laboratory and her art studio--the place where she puts into practice the theory and methods that she teaches about and writes about in the world of academia.
As an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary scholar Sarah teaches academic classes for the University of Maine at Augusta (housed on the Bangor campus), writes books and articles, advises and mentors students, creates and manages curriculum, coordinates the interdisciplinary studies program, serves on committees, and all of the other work that being a professor entails.
But the world of academia is one of boundaries and rules, and Sarah has struggled to balance these two worlds throughout her career, but especially now that she is technically a business owner. The Spiral Goddess Collective is transitioning from a physical space to a body of work, a container for her big ideas and vision of how public scholarship meets entrepreneurship. Here, she grows her Embodied Movement and Social Justice programs and provides support and space for others to grow their own dreams and offerings.
In 2022 she created The Spiral Goddess Collective, a Center for Mind/Body Movement and the Spiral Goddess Collective Care Fund (SGCCF) scholarship program to amplify the work she has been doing through her work as a professor for more than a decade—offering free yoga and dance classes, workshops, and retreats to the greater Bangor community—because she believes that we are more powerful when we are connected, when we lift each other up, and when we hold space for the healing and transformation of ourselves as well as others.
In 2025, the downtown Bangor space for The Spiral Goddess Collective was rebranded and transformed into Spiral Studio. Spiral Studio is Sarah's laboratory and her art studio--the place where she puts into practice the theory and methods that she teaches about and writes about in the world of academia.
As an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary scholar Sarah teaches academic classes for the University of Maine at Augusta (housed on the Bangor campus), writes books and articles, advises and mentors students, creates and manages curriculum, coordinates the interdisciplinary studies program, serves on committees, and all of the other work that being a professor entails.
But the world of academia is one of boundaries and rules, and Sarah has struggled to balance these two worlds throughout her career, but especially now that she is technically a business owner. The Spiral Goddess Collective is transitioning from a physical space to a body of work, a container for her big ideas and vision of how public scholarship meets entrepreneurship. Here, she grows her Embodied Movement and Social Justice programs and provides support and space for others to grow their own dreams and offerings.
