School of Environment, Arts and Society alumna, Prisca Dorcas, spoke at the University of Portland during their Diversity Dialogues event to share her graduate school experience at Vanderbilt University as a Latina in a predominantly white university.
Dorcas, who received her Bachelor’s Degree in English from FIU in 2010, encountered a sense of culture shock after moving from Miami to Nashville for her master’s program.
During her discussion to nearly 100 faculty, staff and students, Dorcas shared some of her personal stories of having panic attacks in social situations due to racism.
“I started to experience things that I had never experienced before, and it altered me drastically,” Dorcas said. “I began writing to heal from all these experiences of being in a (predominantly white institution).”
That was when she created Latina Rebels, a multi-platform account (Twitter, Instagram and Facebook) that combines humor, Latinx culture and activism to unveil the complexities of what it means to be Latinx today.
The Beacon reported that at the beginning of her presentation, Dorcas emphasized that her experiences do not necessarily reflect those of all members of the Latinx community, but many audience members said they did relate to Dorcas’ stories.
This article first appeared in The Beacon on March 5, 2018.
