by Ariana Brown

I entered the white world of collegiate education as a first generation college student, a working class AfroLatina. Immediately, I found myself unable to relate to my peers, people who spoke multiple languages because of their “summers in Paris,” not out of necessity; whose parents paid their tuition out of pocket; the children of CEOs, investment bankers, engineers. Feeling erased, I came to Black Studies because I knew I could not survive the next four years without it.