Jacqueline is a twenty-one-year-old Black female. She is introspective and soft-spoken, reflecting her modest, humble Christian upbringing where one speaks only when spoken to and lowers one’s eyes in the presence of elders. Her curly brown hair is often straightened or pulled back in a bun and dark- rimmed glasses frame her skin, the color of butterscotch. Often dressed in university apparel, she came to the university from a community college. When we first met, she was a junior studying early childhood education and minoring in sociology. Through much hard work on both of our parts, she received a scholarship that enabled her to study abroad in Ghana. That was the beginning of her transformative experience.

When Jacqueline shared with me the reasons she wanted to travel to Ghana, she raised her eyes and looked deeply into mine: She knew that the stories she’d heard about Black people—from continent...

You do not currently have access to this content.