Degrees of Difference: Reflections of Women of Color on Graduate School

University commitments to diversity and inclusivity have yet to translate into support for women of color graduate students. Sexism, classism, homophobia, racial microaggressions, alienation, disillusionment, a lack of institutional and departmental support, limited help from family and partners, imposter syndrome, narrow reading lists—all remain commonplace. Indifference to the struggles of women of color in graduate school and widespread dismissal of their work further poisons an atmosphere that suffocates not only ambition but a person's quality of life.

In Degrees of Difference, women of color from diverse backgrounds give frank, unapologetic accounts of their battles—both internal and external—to navigate grad school and fulfill their ambitions. At the same time, the authors offer strategies for surviving the grind via stories of their own hard-won successes with self-care, building supportive communities, finding like-minded mentors, and resisting racism and unsupportive faculty and colleagues.

Contributors: Aeriel A. Ashlee, Denise A. Delgado, Nwadiogo I. Ejiogu, Delia Fernández, Regina Emily Idoate, Karen J. Leong, Kimberly D. McKee, Délice Mugabo, Carrie Sampson, Arianna Taboada, Jenny Heijun Wills, and Soha Youssef

Kimberly D. McKee is an associate professor in the Integrative, Religious, and Intercultural Studies Department at Grand Valley State University and the author of Disrupting Kinship: Transnational Politics of Korean Adoption in the United States. Denise A. Delgado received her Ph.D. from The Ohio State University and works as an analyst and trainer.