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Africana Studies Student Highlights

Africana Studies Abroad

Karin Carthins in Tanzania, Africa

Karin Carthins in Tanzania, Africa where she studied at the Ethnographic Field School

Karin Carthins feeding turtles in Tanzania, Africa

Karin Carthins feeding turtles in Tanzania, Africa

KARIN CARTHINS IN TANZANIA, AFRICA:

In the summer of 2018 I enrolled into an Ethnographic Field School in Tanzania, Africa. The study abroad group consisted of eight Dickinson College students. There were a wide variety of areas of academic focus, our majors ranging from Neuroscience to Economics. The six-week ethnographic field school provided us with the resources to conduct qualitative research focusing on topics relating to culture, health, nutrition, and political economy in Southwest rural village of Kibatata. The Cultural Anthropology course led by Anthropology Professors Karen Weinstein and James Ellison fostered the perfect environment to combine my Africana Studies and Sociology double major with my Food Studies Certificate.


 

Sakinah Hobbs-Jones attending an African instrumental class in Cuba

 Dana Marecheau, Sakinah Hobbs-Jones, and Isoke Senghor attending an African instrumental class in Cuba

SAKINAH HOBBS-JONES IN CUBA:

My experience in Cuba allowed for endless opportunities for culture exchange. Cuba was very humbling as I reflected on American culture and the poor habits we have. I felt most humiliated surrounding our practice of over consumption. Another broad idea I learned from Cuba was solidarity: solidarity between races, genders, and the entire nation on Cuba. Since Cuba’s founding fathers were white and Black men, the Cuban people identify as a nation before they identify as their race which brought me so much reassurance that there is hope in the humanity to acknowledge we, as humans, share one world. My favorite exchange was through the language of dancing. We learned Cuban traditional and contemporary dances and took an African dance and instrument class while learning the relationship  between the dancer and the instruments.


Study Abroad in South Africa

Lilly Eidelberg in Durban, South Africa

I had the privilege of studying abroad in South Africa for the spring semester of my junior year. The group consisted of 9 students from various schools around America with diverse academic interests. Due to covid restrictions we spent most of our time in Durban with limited excursions to Mozambique and Capetown. In order to study the social and political transformation in South Africa after apartheid and who is being affected and how, we lived with families with different socioeconomic statuses, political beliefs, and cultures. I was able to experience South Africa in my homestays as well as in the classroom where we heard lecturers with various opinions and solutions regarding South Africa’s past, present, and future. I am so grateful for my experience in South Africa as it further awakened me to how crucial understanding positionality is especially as we learn what it means to be an American internationally. I loved being able to cook traditional foods with my host families and exchange cultures around the dinner table while learning each other’s language.