We have been together
in community all day,
it feels like, but
it feels wonderful.
And so I'm just so excited
about this particular panel
that we're getting
ready to have,
these beautiful black
women that have--
listen-- that have graduated
from Harvard Divinity School
and continue to amaze those
of us who follow behind them.
And so I'm just going to go
ahead and introduce this panel
quickly.
The Beyond HDS panel focuses
on the beautiful black women
who have matriculated through
Harvard Divinity School.
Each of them have cultivated
and nourished a community
for black students here at HDS
that continue to follow them.
We honor them in their
work that they have also
contributed to the black
religious spirituality
and culture conference.
It would not be here today
without Taylor Stewart,
and so--
[APPLAUSE]
--we have to honor her--
[INAUDIBLE]
I know.
--and those who also
co-authored and co-planned
the original black religious
spirituality conference, which
is also, I believe,
Karlene Sekou,
who will be speaking later
on at the dinner tonight--
at the [INAUDIBLE] dinner.
And am I missing
anyone from-- no?
OK, thank you.
So we honor those special women.
Without them, we
would not have today.
And as we continue,
our panelists
will give us their
experiences for life after HDS
and will center how black women
who graduate from this space
take their learnings
to the beyond.
It does not have to
stay in the academy.
Our experiences here
cultivate the future
for future generations to come.
So on our panel, we
have Taylor Steward.
Taylor is a second
year doctoral student
in counseling psychology
at Boston College's Lynch
School of Education
and Human Development,
and a graduate of
Harvard Divinity School.
She got her MDiv in 2018.
Her research focuses on the
mental health of students
of color attending predominantly
white universities,
racial trauma, and
spiritual, religious coping.
While at HDS, her studies
focused on spiritual care
and counseling, particularly
for college students
of African descent.
Taylor is a race and
culture researcher
for the Institute for
the Study and Promotion
of Race and Culture
at Boston College,
which was founded by her
doctoral advisor, Dr. Janet
Helms.
Post HDS, Taylor
continued working
in university chaplaincy
at Wellesley College
for an additional year.
She now works as a therapist
for college students.
This academic year, she
is receiving her training
at Massachusetts College of
Art and Design Counseling
and Wellness Center.
In the upcoming
academic year, she
will receive training at
Wellesley College Stone Center
Counseling Services.
Sadada Jackson is a
student of practice
who lives in her body and
vacations in her mind.
She holds a bachelors
of art in theater
with a minor in English,
and an master in education
and secondary education,
both from UMass Boston,
and an MTS in
indigenous tradition
from Harvard University's
Divinity School.
She's a certified 200 hour yoga
teacher and a teacher trainer
for Akasha yoga?
Mhm.
I want to make sure I say that
correctly-- studio at Four
Corners Yoga in wellness yoga
teacher certification program.
Presently, she works as
an independent consultant.
She works with leaders,
educators, and trainers
in the field of education,
training, wellness,
and healing.
A facilitator,
coach, and speaker,
she supports the groups and
individuals in embodying
and curating ethical
relationships and practices
and sustainable
structures in their work.
Her goal in doing
this work is to end
relational and
structural violence done
on marginalized bodies.
She is Natick--
[? Nitma. ?]
[? Nitma, ?] thank you.
We also have Chandra Plowden.
Chandra Plowden is a woman,
a thinker, religious scholar,
preacher, and
barbecue enthusiast.
[LAUGHTER]
Born and raised in
Manning, South Carolina,
Chandra is a first
year doctoral student
at Harvard
University's Committee
on the Study of Religion.
Her research interests focus
on black southern women,
storytelling, black
Atlantic religions,
and Afro Protestant
religious histories.
Chandra is a 2018 graduate
of Harvard Divinity School's
master of divinity program.
While at Harvard, she was named
a Harvard Ministry Fellow,
the highest fellowship
any MDiv student
may receive during
her academic tenure.
Additionally,
Chandra was awarded
the 2017 Billings
Preaching Prize,
an annual Harvard
competition and tradition
for MDiv students.
Chandra was licensed
as a Baptist minister
at the [? Alfreds ?] Baptist
Church in Alexandria, Virginia
in 2015, and has
shared the pulpit
with well-known preachers,
scholars, and social justice
activists.
Before attending
Harvard, Chandra
served in nonprofit and
corporate research sectors
in Washington DC area.
She also holds a
master of public policy
from the University of
Minnesota and a bachelor of arts
degree in English and political
science from Columbia College
in Columbia, South Carolina.
She is a member of the Boston
alumni chapter of Delta Sigma
Theta sorority incorporated.
Thank you.
[LAUGHTER]
And now we also have
this panel moderated
by the one, the only,
Dr. Gloria White-Hammond.
Oh, yes.
Oh, yes.
Yes.
Yes.
Dr. White-Hammond's
ministry of healing spans
four decades and two continents.
She served as a dedicated
pediatrician at the South End
Community Health Center
from 1981 to 2008,
where she provided care
for resilient families
from some of Boston's most
challenged communities.
In order to provide additional
support for her most vulnerable
adolescent female patients,
Dr. White-Hammond founded Do
the Write Thing--
W-R-I-T-E-- in 1994.
The ministry subsequently
served over 200 high risk girls
through small groups
in Boston Public
Schools, juvenile detention
facilities, and on site
at Bethel AME Church.
Dr. White-Hammond was appointed
Swartz Resident Practitioner
in Ministry Studies
in 2015, where
she develops learning
opportunities
for students to explore the
intersection of medicine
and spirituality.
She also co-directs the Harvard
Medical School and HDS course
medicine and
spirituality in healing,
along with Dr. John Peteet of
Dana Farber Cancer Institute.
Dr. White-Hammond is a
graduate of Boston University
with her AB in 1972,
Tufts University School
of Medicine with her MD In 1976,
and Harvard Divinity School
with her MDiv in 1997.
She is a member of the board of
trustees at Tufts University,
a member of the President's
Advisory Council,
and many other things.
Let's give them a
round of applause.
[APPLAUSE]
All right.
Thank you so much,
and let me just
start by thanking Nicole,
and Ashley, and Kayla
for organizing this event.
This is the conference--
you could also call
it black girl magic.
This is it.
And what I love is that this
is such a diverse audience,
and I think it is so important--
so often the Academy has
conferences where the speakers--
it's the Academy speaking
to the Academy.
It don't mean a thing if
it ain't got no swing.
[INAUDIBLE]
And I really appreciate the
fact that we have people
from the community here and
people who are at the-- we're
all here.
So you built it, and we came.
And I thank you very much.
And so we're going
to talk today.
And I'm going to
get out of your way.
Have we had a great time today?
[APPLAUSE]
Yeah, and I want to
thank you for staying.
See, the people who
came this morning
were the people of little faith.
You're the ones who
said, I'm going to come,
and I'm going to stay
until I get everything
I need out of this experience.
So hallelujah.
Thank you for your presence.
We're going to begin now by
having Sadada come and do
a presentation.
As you know, the format
is each of our presenters
will give a 10 to 12
minute presentation.
Then we'll have a little
discussion among us,
and then we want to
open it up so that there
is conversation among us all.
So without further ado,
please receive sister Sadada.
Amen.
[APPLAUSE]
So [NON-ENGLISH].
Good afternoon.
It's really, really, really
good to be here with all of you.
Welcome and thank you.
I know that we've already
done a land acknowledgment
this morning, but I really try
to be a person of practice,
or at least return
to my practice.
It tells you a little bit
about kind of where I am
and who I am.
And that's kind of a
cornerstone of my work--
is that my work teaches me,
and then I teach in my work.
So I want to acknowledge
this land, this space,
this relationship, our
mother, to whom I am kin.
The land of the Massachusetts--
I am part of a sister tribe
of theirs, their landed kin,
as a native [INAUDIBLE].
I want to acknowledge the
[INAUDIBLE] and the Wampanoag.
I am grateful to the people
of this land and my ancestors,
who are [INAUDIBLE].
Come on in.
I want to extend some
gratitude to our ancestors
of African descent, whose
labors of this land,
and whose love of
their descendants
to be free, to be happy, to be
joyous, made our institutions
and infrastructures possible.
I want to continue my gratitude
to Professor [? Alupina ?]
for providing me space and
time to theorize about what
I will talk through you today.
I also want to thank Professor
Giles for providing me
the space to
practice in this way.
And I want to especially
thanks to Todne Thomas--
Professor Todne
Thomas, who advised
me to find spaces where I could
write and I could be who I am.
So presently I'm in the
process of clarifying my work,
and for me, that means
aligning my work of what I've
done, what I'm doing, what I
intend to do to bring stillness
and peace to the world, to those
who I come in contact with,
and to myself.
As an artist, a
dancer, and an actor--
as a teacher of dance,
theater, and yoga--
as a teacher
developer, a director,
a community based organizer, and
an introvert with a big heart
that hurts, that
loves, that breaks,
that hurts-- did I
tell you that it hurts?
And it hurts others sometimes.
One resource I found
most useful is space.
Today I'm going to talk to
you about a practice of space
and the sensorium.
I will also provide by
invitation a practice.
Now, you don't have to RSVP,
and you simply need a practice
if you choose, and
if you don't choose,
to allow others to do the
same either to choose or not
to choose.
So the method that I'll
use for this presentation
will be a read
aloud, think aloud.
This is borrowed from
an English language arts
method of kind of making
explicit my thinking, how
I'm doing it kind of model.
Hopefully give you
space to reflect
to hopefully be inspired, and
maybe we'll have some fun.
I got a homework assignment from
my sister [? prophet friend ?]
[INAUDIBLE],, and
he said, have fun.
And I think because he knows
that I'm often very serious,
and sometimes it's
because I'm very scared.
So the theories.
The one on the left, the
sensorium-- it says sensoria,
but that's--
I want to talk about sensorium.
So that's the theory in
which I'll talk about.
This is the theory that
Kathryn Linn Geurts
speaks about in her book,
Culture and Senses--
Bodily Ways of Knowing
in African Communities.
This is a book that I used--
is a cornerstone of
my independent study
with Professor [? Alupina, ?]
that-- on an independent study
that I called African indigenous
religions and the body.
Although her work is specific
to the Anglo-Ewe people,
I have this experience of bodily
way of knowing as a dancer,
as an educator of
dance, of theater,
and of yoga, and even
as a teacher developer,
and as a program director.
Geurts argues, quote, "that
culture sensory order,
or sensorium, is one of the
first and most basic elements
of making ourselves human."
She defines sensorium--
sensory order as, quote,
"a pattern of relative
importance and differential
elaborations of various senses
through which children learn
to perceive and experience the
world in which they develop
their abilities."
As a person who
lives in her body
and just vacations
in her mind, I
found this to be true
about me as an adult.
And I work to provide this
embodied experience for those
who I work with so
that they can continue
to experience the world and
develop their abilities,
because aren't we all growing?
So Geurts' works led me to
do some of my own theorizing
about this notion
of making space.
And as an artist, teacher,
educator, student of practice--
and I'm also thinking about how
to use this theory in practice
to begin what we have been
kind of reflecting about today,
a praxis.
This praxis is what I
used to create spaces
of learning and
healing in my work,
and it's something I'm both
privately trying to clarify,
and now publicly working
with you to do that, too.
And so I'll talk about
now the theorizing piece,
which is space.
So space oftentimes
seems amorphic.
It's this thing, but I
want to do some naming
that space is a physical
thing, and that space
can be defined as distance
between two objects.
For me, that kind of distance
can be an insecure place,
because I'm not always
feeling a connection either
to the other beings or bodies,
or to what I'm thinking,
or what's going on in the space.
And I can better understand
what Thich Nhat Hanh then
refers to when I can be in
this kind of physical space
when I ask myself--
what Thich Nhat Hanh says, what
is the nature of this distance?
And when I can understand that,
sometimes something shifts,
and I start to learn
something different.
It's new.
It's unplanned.
I call it the unplanned lesson.
There's also
emotional space, which
is distance between
emotional states.
That can be difficult to see,
because emotions are internal,
at least in their origin.
And so I've been
working with this idea
of creating emotional
distance between states.
It takes a lot of practice,
or at least does for me.
And it could be--
and I think that when
we engage what Goethe
says about sensorium,
and how it's
the most basic element
of our human cells,
there might be some
ways in which we
can use other materials to
create an emotional space.
Finally, I want to
say that I'm thinking
about the relational
aspects of space.
I talk about physical
space between objects,
but also the physical
space between my body
and other bodies,
and that it's also--
as much as it's about distance
as it is about embodiment.
And as an educator,
I'm always learning
from these relationships--
the relationships I have with my
work, the relationships that I
have with those who I work
with, and then the relationship
I have practice.
And speaking about
practice, I want
to invite you to
practice with me.
And so I've-- for those
of us who are just--
would rather have kind of more
of a frame than these kind
of theories and these
kind of lofty ideas,
what I've done here is I've
given you kind of the why
and the how.
And in Buddhist
philosophy, which is
another deep influence of the--
influence of my work,
it's called the causes
and conditions.
So why do-- why should we
have these kind of sensorium
spaciousness?
That it create space for
learning-- learning that
can be new,
different, and deeper.
It also creates
space for healing.
When I mean healing, I mean
repair, reconciliation,
recovering, and
I'll add restoring.
And then, how do we do it?
Well we can do it by
providing resources.
These can be human resources,
material resources,
the actual physical space,
currency, and so on.
Also, that it's
based in research,
both something that is
studied conceptually, but also
something that is studied
through the practice,
by practice being studied.
And then finally, it
needs to be revised.
And by revised I mean that--
I mean taking what
you've learned
in an experience of space and
bringing that back into space.
And constantly doing
that again and again
is what I call practice.
So let's practice.
So I have here a song, and
what I invite you to do
is just listen to the song, and
listen to what comes up for you
as you listen to the song.
You could listen to
the words or whatever.
I also invite you
to do whatever you
feel comfortable to get
through this practice,
whether it means move,
whatever that means,
but just be mindful
that people are
practicing in different ways.
So relax in whatever
way that means.
Thank you.
Maybe you can take
a minute and just
reflect on these two
questions for yourself.
Particularly what did you
notice came up in your mind,
in your other senses?
And because our
time is limited, I
want to just leave you
with this, kind of why
this is important for me.
As a black woman, a
black native woman,
in the context of
healing and education,
I think this is important so
we can be our full selves,
so that we can know
real unconditional love,
not love that is imposed on
how and who we should be,
or express ourselves bodily.
And I think to be healthy
and whole, both for ourselves
and for others--
that this is a
reciprocal practice.
For me, at this
time, this practice
is helping me learn and
grow from my mistakes.
It's also helping me to
dream, to grow, and repair,
and repeat.
And it's also helping me
to know what's possible.
It's also helping
me dream, I guess.
So thank you for your
time and your attention.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
Good afternoon, everyone.
Can everyone hear me?
Yes.
OK, we're good?
OK.
Sometimes I speak really softly.
If the volume changes,
just do like this.
Thank you.
So what I have to offer today
is portions of my methodology,
or what I like to
think of my methodology
for my upcoming research
many, many years down
the line after generals.
Y'all pray my strength
that I get through,
but I'm presenting parts of
a paper that I call "Sacred
Storylines--
Storytelling as Womanist,
Black Feminist Methodology
in Religious Studies."
I'd like to start with two
quotes, one from Katie Cannon.
"Womanism requires that
we stress with urgency
the African-American women's
movement from life to death.
We investigate
contestable issues
according to the official
records, which seldom offer
any indication why
things have gone wrong,
nor why benefactors
of oppression
strive to maintain certain
principles, values,
and taboos as the center
of social reality.
In other words, womanist
religious scholars
insist that individuals look
back at race, sex and class
constructions before
it is too late,
and put forth critical
analysis in such a way
that the errors of the
past will not repeat."
I offer one more quote
from Linda Thomas,
another womanist thinker,
another womanist scholar.
"Admittedly
reconstructing knowledge
is like tearing down a
formidable edifice that
has been built over an
extensive number of years.
A womanist, in her
reconstruction of knowledge,
must not only be a
diligent craft person.
She must also
develop an approach
that utilizes the kind
of technology that
can dismantle the
seemingly indestructible
original building materials."
So in these two quotes,
womanist theologian Katie Cannon
offers a clear
directive that wom--
that the study of
womanism is to observe
the daily lives of black
women for critical analysis,
and in the womanist the
analysis, to privilege
intersections of race, sex,
and class constructions.
Thomas furthers Cannon's
charge by advocating
the use of technology that
privileges black women's
voices, and also critiques
mainstream thought.
Indeed, womanist work
includes making new paths
with apt tools that
recover that which has been
obscured by Western narratives.
This paper promotes the
storytelling, or the practice
of storytelling, as
a useful technology
in black feminist, womanist,
ethno-historic analysis
of black women's religious
lives in the United States.
More specifically, my work
and my forthcoming work--
God willing-- discusses
how storytelling narratives
in service to black liberation
includes sermons, newspaper
clippings, anecdotes, letters,
fables, conversations,
gossip as methods of
understanding black women's
lives in America.
So in a sense, one could
consider storytelling
as the original qualitative
research method.
With public discourse, it helps
to inform one's mental framing
and reform-- framing processes.
Despite intense efforts to fill
the void of critical history
analysis in black women's
spiritual orientations,
much evacuation still--
not much evacuation-- much
excavation still remains.
As an analytical approach,
womanist religious scholars
aptly identify with
the daily struggles--
the daily struggles--
of black women
in literary and
scriptural characters.
So for example, one of the
literary womanist figures
could include Hagar,
the Egyptian slave
in the Judeo-Christian
narrative, and also
many of the women protagonists
within Toni Morrison's Beloved.
So through literary figures,
womanist religious scholars
can help articulate a
didactic and twofold purpose--
one, to offer a re-evaluation
of dominant Western thought
and ethics--
and two, to reconstruct
events that the lie--
that have been obscured.
So storytelling is
really described as--
in my paper, as
something that pushes
womanist and black
feminist literary analysis
by continuously framing real
life black women's experiences
as identifiable with the daily
struggles of other black women.
This method and
my proposed method
complements the task of women
theologians to, and I quote,
"retrieve sources from the past,
sort and evaluate materials,
and thereby construct
new epistemologies
that effect change
in the space and time
occupied by black women."
Further, storytelling
assists in ethnographic and
non-ethnographic methodologies
in religious studies
by interrogating the spiritual
dispositions and phenomena that
have occurred in
black women's lives.
Womanist methodology in
order to-- and I quote--
"discover fragments
to create a narrative
for the present and
future," end quote,
actively engages with
living black women.
But how can a womanist
religious scholar
engage with the life
experiences of the now deceased?
Because storytelling appeals to
both ethnographic and historic
methods, stories
do have the ability
to resurface posthumous voices
and enter into communities
of black women
utilizing their life
experiences as the primary
sources for the development
of questions which
establish a knowledge
base from everyday people.
Let me exit out of this.
Get it away.
There we go.
So further, critical
analyses of African-American
women's religious agency
allows scholars to--
a lens, rather, to explore
an ideology and theology
of liberation through
subordination sometimes,
or liberation via
forms of blendedness.
Feminist theorist [? Lewis ?]
[? McKay ?] defines agency
as the capacity for
autonomous action in the face
of overwhelming cultural
sanctions and structural
inequalities.
This definition,
however, does not
aid in the articulation of
circumscribed modes of agency
that rely on communal or
patriarchal institutions.
Even with robust
efforts, there is still
a lack of critical
analysis of black women
and their spirituality
practices.
Even 20 years after
[? Weisenfeld ?]
and Newton's pivotal work on
African-American religious
women's biographies,
the religious lives
of African-American
women still loom
as a substantial, yet
largely undiscovered
terrain in the study
of religion in America.
Because of womanisms
focus primarily
and context on
agency, perhaps agency
can fall under circumscribed
modes of other forms of agency.
Womanist agency, as
defined by Walker--
Alice Walker-- is courageous,
audacious, and willful.
Monica Coleman complements
Walker's adjectives
by defining agency as acts
of creative transformation
that aid in survival.
By linking agency with an
African-American truism--
making a way out of no way--
perhaps we can come up with
other womanist methodologies.
So in my research, and in
my lifespan as a scholar,
I'm looking to advocate
for storytelling
as a useful practice in the
method of forwarding analyses
on religious black American
women in the United States.
Womanist black
feminist theology is
both constructive
and reconstructive.
Moreover, if it
forwards the voices
of black women in their daily
lives and socio-religious
spheres especially,
and remembers
the daily interactions and
legacies of the deceased,
then it is a useful project.
Because black women-- like
womanist, black feminist
thought is centered in the
African-American woman's
reality and story,
storytelling opens itself
up to the possibility
of being a useful praxis
in gathering new and
hidden histories.
Therefore, privileging
black women
helps to debunk and clarify
dominant monovocal accounts,
constrictions, constructions,
reconstructions of knowledge.
It serves as a heuristic
in following directives
put forward by previous
womanist and black feminists.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
Good afternoon.
Good afternoon.
I'm so excited to be here.
It's wonderful to be
invited to be on a panel,
especially after the work
that we did while here to try
to get this conference started.
Oh, yes.
[LAUGHTER]
Today I'm going to really
talk about what it's
been like for me in my
studies here at HDS,
and how to apply that to
the work that I'm doing,
and the work that I hope to do.
So a little bit about myself.
As was read in the
biography, I got my MDiv
from here, graduated in 2018.
And I studied spiritual care
and counseling while I was here,
and currently I'm doing my
PhD in counseling psychology
at Boston College Lynch
School of Education and Human
Development.
And something that I would
love for you all to think about
throughout my brief
presentation is kind of the role
that your own religion
and spirituality
may have played in
your own understandings
of mental health, be that in a
positive way, a negative way.
So that's something that I would
love for everybody to hold,
and think about, and today
I'm going to really talk
about how I've used my education
that I attained here to further
my own understanding
and hopefully
the field's understanding
of connections
between spirituality
and mental health.
In my population of studies,
black college students,
particularly--
or college students,
particularly, but my research
focuses on students
of African descent.
So while at HDS, I've studied
spiritual care and counseling
through a non-tradition
specific lens,
and that was because I knew that
I wanted to become a therapist.
And what was
important for me was
to try to understand how
to better reach clients
in a way that touched the
essence of who they are
and in a way that also
acknowledged their spirituality
and religion, which is something
that traditional psychotherapy
doesn't necessarily
reach upon as much,
but there's more of a
push towards that now,
which is wonderful.
So I was introduced to the
power of spiritual counseling
when I was doing--
when I was working
at an AIDS nonprofit.
And I was in at one
of the support groups,
and it was an AIDS nonprofit
that was for black people.
And it was a men's
support group.
And the therapist
in that group began
talking about issues of
religion and spirituality.
And you saw these
tough men begin
to cry, break down, talk about
how powerful a role it had,
be that in a positive
way or a negative way.
And you could really see
the transformative power
of bringing this into
the counseling arena.
And so that's what inspired
me to actually come
to divinity school.
And while I was here,
I had the pleasure
of working with Dr.
Cheryl Giles, who
was mentioned earlier, and
she's a clinical psychologist
who's a lecturer at the
Divinity School, as well.
And so being able
to work beneath her
was very, very, very,
very important for me
in my own formation
of what I hoped to do.
So while I was here
from my field education,
I did chaplaincy at
Mass General Hospital.
So I provided spiritual care
for cancer patients there,
and I was able to really
incorporate things
that I was learning in
class into practice.
How do you meet a client where
they are, a patient where
they are, regardless
of their spiritual
or religious background?
So I had clients
at Mass General who
were all in a particular
infusion unit,
and this infusion unit was
for patients who their--
I hate to say their last
hope was a clinical trial.
And so these were the
patients that I had
the privilege of working with.
And I had patients
who identified
as Catholic, who identified
as Muslim, who identified
as atheist, agnostic, Wiccan.
I had a huge variety of
religious and spiritual beliefs
that I got to work with,
which was extremely, extremely
powerful.
And then in my final
year of Divinity School,
I started working as a chaplain
for students of African descent
at Wellesley College.
And that was such a blessing,
because they asked me--
they said, Taylor, we
know what you study,
we'd love for you to come
back and kind of be there
for our students.
And so I got to
really sit with them
as they were navigating what it
means to not only be a student,
but what it means to be a black
student on a predominately
white campus, and the kind of
pain that can come with that,
and the role that religion
and spirituality can
play in our lives.
So it was very amazing to be
working with those students,
and I worked with
them for two years.
I worked with them after
I left here, as well,
but I stopped working
with them this year,
just because of other things.
And so my thesis
work really focused
on a liberation focused
spiritual counseling
for college students
of African descent
attending predominately
white institutions of higher
learning.
And this was
particularly targeted
towards spiritual
care that's being
done across racial and
cultural boundaries.
So I think that especially
for our black students who
are attending these
predominantly white colleges
and universities,
a lot of times you
don't see a lot people
who look like you
within the administration,
within chaplaincy departments.
And so how can we help
the chaplains do better
at reaching these students?
So that was really what
that paper focused on.
And in that paper, I really
talked about ways for chaplains
to place students at the center,
explore their own world views,
gearing the spiritual care
not just towards liberation
while acknowledging the context.
So not just not acknowledging
the difficulty, the pain,
the political atmosphere,
the police brutality,
the injustices,
systemic oppression,
making sure that that's
a part of this space,
and thinking about
ways that we can
use our spirituality
and our faith
to kind of envision a better
future, and work towards that,
and kind of sustain.
So that was at HDS.
Beyond HDS, I went on to do
my PhD, which I'm still doing.
And my research has
dived more deeply
into spirituality and
religion amongst students
and mental health.
And so currently, I am
working on a study that
focuses on spiritual
and religious coping,
and the role that it can play
in black students' lives,
particularly in response to
perceived racism on campus,
and relating that to their
overall psychological
well-being.
And so within psychology,
religion and spirituality
are considered to be
a protective factor.
So it can serve as
some kind of buffer
against the development
of some kind
of psychopathology
or mental illness.
And one thing about black
people in this country
is that religion
and spirituality
have been an integral
part of our communities.
In surveys-- nationwide
surveys, it shows that African--
people of African descent
are the most religious
identifying and spiritual
identifying people
of all racial and ethnic
groups within America, as well
as within college students.
Black students are-- identify
as the most religious
and spiritual.
They tend to attend any
kind of religious space
more than their white
counterparts-- followed
by Asian-American, and
then Latinx students.
And also they tend to draw upon
their religion and spirituality
for sources of strength in order
to cope with things that they
are going through.
So that's what my study
is focusing on right now.
I put some seminars,
discussion, and workshops.
I've had an amazing
opportunity to kind of speak
with mental health clinicians
through a workshop, talking
about ways that we can better
incorporate spirituality
and religion into the work
that we're doing with students,
particularly if it's coming
up as something that's
contributing to their
[INAUDIBLE] concern when
they're coming into therapy.
And something that I think is
really important to think about
in this work is that,
oftentimes within psychology
and psychotherapy, religion
and spiritual belief
or pathologized.
And so they are
looked at as something
that is either
dismissed, or seen
as not as important or pivotal
within someone's mental health
functioning.
And the data shows us that
that just is not the case.
It actually is playing
a significant role.
And so some of the
things that I have--
am learning about
myself, and also
speaking with other
clinicians about
is, how can we
better incorporate
spirituality and religion
into our conceptualization
of our clients?
And so part of that is including
religious and spiritual
identity on the intake when
you're working with clients.
So often, when you go into
a mental health counseling
session, you have
this huge intake.
They ask you about
all these things,
but they don't ask you about
your religion and spirituality.
And so that's something that
the current mental health
counseling center
I'm working with
has incorporated
into their intake
this year after our discussions,
which is pretty amazing,
because it comes up a
lot within our sessions,
but clinicians may
not know exactly how
to address those needs.
Some things that are
important working
with clients, even within
your own community,
is thinking about--
or yourselves--
thinking about how
your own religious or
spiritual values and beliefs
may be contributing to what you
may be experiencing currently
mental health-wise,
well-being wise.
And also if you do access
mental health care,
how a clinician can
better incorporate
your own understanding of
yourself, of the spiritual,
of the religious
into your treatment
if that's something that's
very important for you.
And then also another thing that
I think about a lot in my work
that I'm doing with my
clients now and in the work
that I hope to continue to do
is broadening understandings
of what spirituality is.
[INAUDIBLE]
OK.
And so what that can look
like is a lot of time
sometimes think spirituality
and religion is just one box,
but spiritual
nourishment can come
in so many different
fashions, and so that
can be through, as you
showed, that beautiful music
that you played, and it
can be through music.
It can be through community.
There's many different
ways that people
find spiritual nourishment.
It's important to think
about that and not just clump
religion and
spirituality into a box.
And also being aware--
for me, I do view
the therapy work
that I do as a
spiritual practice.
And so thinking
about how I show up
within session, my own location,
religiously or spiritually,
and how that impacts my
understanding of work
with my students and my clients.
So yeah, those are
some ways that I
have incorporated
what I've learned here
into the practical realm.
It informs a lot of my research.
It informs a lot of my writings.
It informs a lot
of the discussions
that I enjoy having in ways
that I try to incorporate better
understandings of how to address
religious and spirit-- religion
and spirituality within
mental health counseling.
And I have a couple of things
that I'm writing right now that
I hope will be
published-- we shall see--
that really encapsulates
some of those points
that I've tried to
touch upon briefly here.
I didn't want to read
anything, because sometimes I
feel like that language is very
much so academic and jargony.
But yeah, so that's
really the beyond for me.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you so much
for the [INAUDIBLE]
and thank you for the
work that you're doing.
It's very
groundbreaking, and even
in this early stint
as a [INAUDIBLE]..
So I'm going to
[INAUDIBLE] some questions.
There's a few for each of you.
I have a different question
as how you kind of reflect.
And let me inform you.
This is-- as you've hear,
I'm a pediatrician, and one
of the reasons I
love pediatrics--
and I'm so glad there was a
child in the house earlier
[? on. ?] As long as
there's a kid in the house,
I know that they'll be OK.
[LAUGHTER] I'd love to
understand how people evolve
to become who they, and
the experiences they have,
people they encounter that
all inform who they become.
And some of my questions
will be in context.
So I want to begin with a
question for you, Taylor.
In the New Testament--
in Christian Bible,
in the New Testament,
one of our--
the favorite
references is to what
we call the cloud of witnesses.
And these are the people who are
no longer present in the flesh.
They've died, but
the scripture says
that they've joined that cloud
of witnesses who cheer us on
as we run this race.
And I also think of them as
the angels on your shoulder.
And I wonder if--
I'm going to put all
my questions out first.
If you could share with us
one of the angels that's
on your shoulder
that enables you
to get from where
you were once up
a time to where you are today.
And then I have a
question for you, Chandra,
and this is-- you've
mentioned Toni Morrison,
and I wonder if you could
reflect on a comment
that Toni Morrison made.
And as I-- before I share this
comment, I do want to have a--
just a little bit of disclaimer.
The church woman in me has
a little bit of disclaimer
in terms of the vocabulary.
And let me just
preface it with this.
A couple of months ago,
at the end of service,
I was going around to
check in with people how
you're doing, whatever, and I
met-- just met one of our moms.
And I-- and I love
this mom because she's
a mom of two boys, and her
first one is very cerebral.
And her second one--
I love kids who got spunk,
who don't take no stuff,
won't be no stuff.
And so that is-- that
is her second one.
If she had had
Miles first, Miles
would have not only
been alpha male.
He would've been OK.
He would've been it.
And so I check in with her to
see, OK, what's he doing now.
So she said to me-- so Pastor
Hammond had been preaching,
and it was--
it's all about vision
for the new year,
and you should do this,
and you should pray,
and you should be in
conversation with people--
a bunch of shoulds.
And about the fourth should
in, she was telling me
about miles, who has been really
playing with saying bad words.
They had to scold him
around saying bad words.
So about the fourth should in,
he turned to her and said--
and said to her,
did he say shit?
[LAUGHTER]
Loud enough for
other people to hear.
No, Pastor Hammond
did not say that word.
So here's the comment
that Toni Morrison had.
You want to fly,
you've got to give up
the shit that weighs you down.
And I wonder what shit
has weighed you down
that you had to give up?
[LAUGHTER]
And then the third one--
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
--is one that I've
been reflecting
on at this stage in my life.
And thank you for having
the AARP on the panel.
But this is a reflection
from Soren Kierkegaard,
who we know is a noted
theologian and philosopher.
These are not the exact
words, but this is essentially
the reflection,
the reminder that,
while we live life
going forward,
we understand life
looking backward.
And I wonder if you could share
with us an experience that,
when you were there, as my-- as
Ray's mother would have said,
this don't make
no kind of sense.
It was an experience
that felt like it did not
make no kind of
sense whatsoever,
but having lived a couple of
minutes longer, oh, I get it.
I understand what
that was about.
So those are our three
questions, and each of you
could respond.
You may have some
responses in your own head,
but do you want to
start first, Taylor?
Sure.
So as far as the
angels on my shoulders,
I would definitely say
that my grandfather is
an ever present angel on
my shoulder, and he was--
Chandra actually
knew him, as well.
Yes.
But he was an
amazing, amazing man.
And he was-- he was a pastor.
He was a preacher.
He was a presiding
elder in the AME church.
He was actually over the
Charleston district right
before the Emanuel Nine.
And he always instilled in
me a very, very strong sense
of faith and living
my life with purpose,
and the power that living my
truth and embodying my faith
can have in transforming
not only my life,
but the lives of others.
And so whenever
I'm doing the work
that I do regarding
spirituality,
or even if it is opportunities
to preach or do Bible studies--
just revealing some of my
own personal identities,
I always kind of hear
him cheering me on.
So I always think
about him there,
and I think that another angel.
And she's-- she's not deceased,
but she is definitely someone I
think about often--
is my very first supervisor when
I was doing chaplaincy work.
She was an amazing
woman who identified--
a white woman who identified
as a humanist, was not really--
she wasn't really into
dictating anyone's life
by any particular
set of doctrine.
And she really just pushed
me, and welcomed me,
and opened me in exploring
my own spirituality
and understanding
how to meet people
where they are regarding
their own religious
and spiritual journeys.
And so those two--
I think about them very often
in the work that I'm doing.
So I'd definitely say
that those are my--
my angels.
Can you call their names for us?
Malachi.
Malachi Lee Duncan
and Katrina Scott.
Thank you, Malachi.
And thank you, Katrina.
I'm going to pull this mic in.
Yeah.
[LAUGHTER]
Yes.
Sorry.
Now, see y'all laughing
at me, but, you know--
I'm just messing with y'all.
So the shit I had
to give up to fly.
It was a lot.
I'm going to
highlight two things.
I think the most important
one was my own sense
of an internal timeline.
So if anybody knows anything
about an inward call,
an inward presence
inside of you,
you kind of have an idea of
what point B is going to be.
You don't know
the stuff that you
have to go through
between point A
and point B to get
to point B, and when
you think you've met point
B, it may not be point B.
And so with that,
I came, actually,
from the world of work.
I was a research analyst,
and I was living real nice.
And then I got the call, which
evolved into multiple calls.
So what do you do with that?
I don't know.
And so I was led enough in
faith in the divine and love
for the divine to give that up.
It was the hardest
thing I've ever done,
and I would do it
nine times over.
And that leads into the
notion of the timeline.
So I was at Harvard,
second master's, kind
of trying to figure out,
what does this call mean?
And at first, I thought the call
was to preach, to just preach,
because in my tradition,
there is still
some type of hype
among televangelists,
and very, very
prominent preachers
that receive media coverage.
And I realized that that
was some of the shit, too,
that I had to give up,
too, and that preaching
is very important.
It is, but that is a tiny, tiny,
tiny, tiny part of ministry.
The largest part of ministry
is doing your own inward work
so you don't mess up
somebody else's life.
[APPLAUSE]
And that is a hard--
that is a hard road.
That is that loop de
loop de loop de loop
in the path in the timeline.
But I would say the other
thing that I had to give up--
and maybe this is turning
into three things--
this notion of story.
So one of the reasons
why I'm taken by stories
is that everybody
has one, and we
get to edit what we
want to tell people,
and what we don't
want to tell people.
And oftentimes, particularly
at Harvard, the story
looks like I graduated
from X, graduated from Y,
and now I do Z. And we don't
talk about the other things.
So one of the biggest
hiccups in my story
was my first year I was
preparing to preach a sermon,
because all I wanted
to do was preach.
At 5:00 AM-- and I get a
call from my mother saying
your daddy had a heart attack,
and it don't look good.
And that was a part
of my story that
caused me to have an
aversion to preaching,
but also strengthened
my preaching in that,
despite life, I have a sense of
duty to me, if to no one else
in this world, to try
to get to point B.
And if point B leads
to point C, or whatever
Roman numeral or a Greek
letter, then-- then that's fine.
Can I say one more thing?
No?
OK, OK.
[INAUDIBLE]
This is going to be
one very short thing.
I get long winded
sometimes with stories,
but the thing that I want
to encourage particularly
black women here is that
this is not the space
where you're going to die.
Period.
This is the space where
you're going to live,
and you'll go out there, and
you're going to keep on living.
That's it.
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you both.
Yeah, so thinking
about something
that didn't make sense--
when I look back at
it now, I get it--
well, there's a lot.
But I'm going to pick
this one thing, which
was my first time I applied
to HDS and didn't get in.
It was 2009-ish, and
I say ish, because I'd
have to look back at like
resume and see, but at the time,
I was in my early 30s.
And I'd been
teaching for a while.
And I left teaching to do
some program directing,
and really wanted to
pursue a master's degree
that was at the
intersection of, then,
Native American
traditions and dance.
And I had been at [? Leslie ?]
and couldn't fund that,
and there was this
program here at HDS
that Diane Moore led, which
was religion and education.
And I thought this is it.
I can explore some
of the things I
think are overlapping
in learning
and in spirituality,
which, I think, is healing,
is repair, is making us whole.
I think that those two
fields do the same thing.
And so when I didn't
get in, I was--
I was devastated, but I
had another application
to try it again.
And so I did.
And I applied a second time
to my first master's program,
which is a residential
based program out
or UMass called Boston
Teachers Residency Program.
And I spent about seven-ish--
yeah, I'm going be very
ish about the time,
because time is so difficult
for me when I look back at it.
And that was a real
growing experience,
and it was mostly growing
because I tried something
again.
Yeah, I know.
And so when I look
back, I was like, why
did I need to do these
things separately?
Why couldn't I just
do it together?
But I realize now
that I needed to forge
a new path, a new path
of understanding of where
indigenous kind of
worldviews and cosmologies
come into contact
with education,
and learning, and developing,
and I'll say healing.
I learned a lot here
just by being a student.
I just really wanted
to immerse myself
in content, and field notes,
and theoretical frameworks
around indigeneity.
And so that's why I'm
kind of beginning.
I'm beginning to kind of make
my container for all the things
that, up until this
[? 20-something ?] years--
[LAUGHTER]
--I've lived this
life, and I've worked.
And I want to offer
something hopefully
new to help free us all.
[? Well done. ?]
Thank you all so much
for sharing [INAUDIBLE].
[APPLAUSE]
We want to have an
opportunity to hear
from you your questions.
You know we can say the
benediction and go home.
That Is OK, too.
[LAUGHTER]
Thank you all for sharing
your work and just being here.
What was something-- what
was a key moment at HDS that
made you sure that this
was the place that you
were supposed to be
at the time that you
were supposed to be here?
I guess I'll start.
So I came to visit day.
Actually, I didn't want
to apply HDS at all.
I was "volun-told" by
my graduate advisor
at the University of Minnesota
that I should apply to Harvard.
Did not want to,
but I did because I
knew I needed his
recommendation letter, so
let me just pay my $75 and
get my recommendation letter.
So I got in, and I
went to visit day.
And I felt this-- the
strangest feeling.
It was like a cold
sensation all over my body--
a very, very cold,
very strong sensation.
And I felt led to go to
go the CSWR and pray,
because the
sensation would not--
it just wouldn't let up off me.
And I heard something say
that this is the final push.
I didn't really know
what that meant.
I have some ideas
of what that meant,
but it was definitely
an inward calling.
And that was continuously
affirmed not necessarily
through classes, but
by the amazing friends
I've made here-- some of the
best friends I've ever had
and probably will ever have.
Question.
Thank you, and [INAUDIBLE]
congratulations.
Thank you.
[INAUDIBLE] done and all that
you continue to do, thank you.
My question is I'm
currently in school,
and we're studying
cultural capital
and whose culture has capital.
So having you African-American
women here at Harvard,
that contrast of cultures,
whose culture has capital,
and how have you used
the culture of Harvard
to increase the
capital [INAUDIBLE]??
That's a good one.
That is such a good question.
And I think that the whose
culture has capital is so real,
and I believe--
for me, I came to Harvard just
because it was pluralistic.
There are a lot of different
religions and spiritualities
represented at this
particular institution,
and that's why I came,
because I want to learn
how to best serve people.
And I think that
going to Harvard
gave me leverage upon leaving
Harvard to better start
being in a position to
better serve my community.
I've found that--
it's so interesting.
I'm a second year
doctoral student,
and yet you trust what
I'm saying when it
comes to spiritual counseling.
I don't necessarily
know if that's
because of my education or
the name of my institution
where I was educated.
And I think that that--
with that comes a large
responsibility, and
it's something that--
particularly as a race and
culture researcher, something
that I think about
a lot, specifically
in the field of psychology.
We constantly
think about who are
these-- who are
these interventions
and theories designed for.
Who is deciding what's important
and what's not important?
And how can we, particularly
my fellow colleagues
who are in my-- with my
advisor-- we think about,
how can we push against that?
And how can we
broaden the narrative
through our own
voices as academics,
yes, within the
canon because that's
what large or dominant
and white society values?
So how can we be more
represented there?
And then also how can
we use our skills?
How can I use my skills
for my community?
And for me, I think that that's
why a lot of the work I do
has been targeted towards
black people and black women.
So like the seminars
on spiritual wellness
are for black women.
The groups that I have
done around spirituality
and mental health have
been for black students.
And I think that that's my way
of using the capital that I got
through being here to
better serve my community,
if that makes sense.
I'd like to answer
the question, too,
on that idea of kind of
how you're leveraging,
because for me, one of the
reasons why I came here
was for the resources.
And I think a big resource
is human resources
through way of relationships.
Now, I don't know that I'm
always good at it, and I--
it is a place where I learn.
And I think it's a place
where all of us learn.
And I think that it's
really important to see
that as a currency, that the
building of that relationship,
the kind of networking of those
relationships are a currency.
They're really valuable, and
I know, for me, that has been,
I think, the biggest thing
that I've kind of gotten out
of being here--
is the relationships
that I have people,
and what it's taught me not
just about me, but the work
that I'm embarking on.
So one of the things
that is actually
an implicit motive
in my research
is the push for reparations.
So one of the reasons why
storytelling is important
is because some people just
do not care about facts.
Some of them just
don't, particularly
given this administration.
And that sometimes stories
are what compel people
to get up and do right.
And so my goal is really like--
I'm trying to play the
long game, if you will,
I guess, in trying to
push through research how
black women especially, in my
proposed site of research--
Charleston, South
Carolina, a slave--
former slave port city--
has contributed to not
only American capital,
but also American culture,
and that reparations,
while it will never repay the
labor and the trauma induced,
that financial-- financial--
and structural
reparations are the start.
Yeah.
Right on.
[APPLAUSE]
Well, thank you so
much, again, for coming.
And I thank you, again,
Nicole, and Ashley, and Kayla
for making this happen.
I'm going to close
with another comment.
And you referenced Katie
Cannon, and if you don't know,
Katie Cannon is--
she's just in a class of her
own, category of her own,
one of the-- we lost Katie.
Was it last year or 2018?
I think that 2018,
I think, was her--
Last year.
Last year.
--was when she-- she passed.
And again, just a giant in terms
of her person and her practice.
And so I'm going to
close with this comment--
is a word of appreciation
to you, to each of you,
and a little bit of
kind of encouragement,
and an affirmation of
what you said, Taylor.
So Dr. Cannon said,
an educated person,
you share the knowledge, and
you empower people with your--
with your knowledge.
And that's what has happened
in terms of your experience
here, that you have shared
your knowledge and your wisdom,
and empowered people.
On the other hand-- and
Asia referred to this--
an educated fool who
has a little learning,
and they beat people up.
Yes, they do.
Thank you so much
for coming here,
for the knowledge
you've gleaned,
for the wisdom
that you developed,
and for making it
available to all of us.
And because of your generosity,
we all the displays a lot
more empowered.
So thank you so much.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
We want to thank Dr. Hammond,
Gloria White-Hammond, Sadada,
Chandra, and Taylor for offering
your gifts in this space.
