From Oppression to Grace: Women of Color and Their Dilemmas Within the Academy

Black Issues in Higher Education, Jan 13, 2005 by Theodorea Regina Berry

From Oppression to Grace: Women of Color and Their Dilemmas Within the Academy

Edited by Dr. Theodora Regina Berry and Dr. Nathalie Mizelle Stylus Publishing, 2004 288pp., $24.95 paperback ISBN: 1579221114; $59.95 hardcover ISBN: 1579221106

This book gives voice to the experiences of women of color--women of African, American Indian, Latina, East Indian, Korean and Japanese descent--as students pursuing terminal degrees and as faculty members navigating the academy, and grappling with the dilemmas they encounter at the intersections of their work and identities.

Women of color are frequently relegated--on account of both race and womanhood--into monolithic categories to perpetuate oppression, subdue and suppress conflict and silence voices. This book uses critical race feminism (CRF) to place women of color in the center rather than in the margins, of the discussion, theory, research and praxis of their lives as they co-exist in a male-dominant culture.

This book is for all women of color growing up in the academy, learning to stand on their own, taking their first steps, mastering the language, walking, running, falling and getting up to run again -and illuminates the process of self-definition that is essential to their growth as scholars and individuals.

Dr. Theodorea Regina Berry is an AERA/IES Post-Doctoral Fellow in the College of Education, University of Illinois at Chicago. Dr. Nathalie Mizelle is an assistant professor in the department of counseling, College of Health and Human Services, San Francisco State University.