Rickerby Hinds is a native of Honduras who came to Los Angeles aged 13. He has an MFA in playwrighting from UCLA's School of Theater, Film and Television Production where he was twice awarded the Audrey Skirball-Kenis Award for Best Play. He is a Fulbright Fellow and a Professor of Playwriting in the Department of Theater Film & Digital Production at the University of California, Riverside, and the only tenured hip-hop theatre Professor in the country. Hinds is one of the pioneers of Hip-Hop theatre which has the ability to challenge conventional notions of the stage while embracing its history and traditions. His work draws on his multifaceted background to create theatre that is simultaneously challenging, compelling and entertaining. His productions explore the human condition employing the aesthetics, as well as the performance instruments of hip-hop culture - MCing, hip-hop dance, beatboxing, graffiti (aerosol art), and DJ-ing. His work has been developed by venues including the Latino Theater Company, The Mark Taper Forum, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, The Royal Court Theatre in London and The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (where he presented the first hip-hop Theater play in their history), and has toured to Romania, Poland, Austria, Hungary and Turkey, his native Honduras, and numerous venues throughout the US.