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Listen, learn, lead.

Embracing My Identity, Hair and All pt. 2 - by Nia Campinha-Bacote

9/23/2016

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This post was originally posted on prettyforablackgirl.blogspot.com titled "How Did I Get Here?" that shares Nia's testimony of how she made the decision to do the "big chop" and her journey of discovering her identity as a black woman in the Lord. 
Nia Campinha-Bacote is currently serving as staff for Chi Alpha at Yale University. 


The next 6 years I spent in utter bliss with my Keratin treatments that loosened my curls, but transformation slowly began to creep in.

It started at Brown University when my perception of myself as the “exceptional black girl” was challenged.  My experiences in high school had made believe I was the exception to the rule that blacks belonged behind bars or entrenched in poverty.  Brown forced me to confront the fact that I had spent 18 years defining black as synonymous with adjectives like ignorant, violent, and poor.

As I enrolled in Africana courses and Ethnic Studies classes at Brown, I began to scratch the surface of what it looked like to embrace the melanin that ran through my veins.  I wasn’t perfect and still had (have) a long way to go, but little by little, I began to see how my world had been inundated with things (media, people, images, classes) telling me black was inherently less than.  Looking back, I believe it wasn't so much as what I was taught in high school and middle school, but what I wasn't taught. I wasn't taught about redlining--the systematic discrimination of refusing blacks housing loans/mortgages/insurance in specific areas up that still affects communities of color today. I wasn't taught about food deserts--the lack of nutritional markets and non-fast-food restaurants existing in lower-income, minority neighborhoods. The list is endless.
...www.drivingdiversity.org/blog/embracing-my-identity-hair-and-all-pt-3-by-nia-campinha-bacote

After graduating from Brown, I served a year in ministry as a campus pastor for undergraduates at Yale.  And that’s when things got real.  


Stay tuned for part 3 out of 3 next week of Nia's journey  on drivingdiversity.org!

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    Contributing Authors


    Belkis Lehmann
    National Diversity Specialist 
    Chi Alpha Campus Ministries 
    Greensboro, NC


    Bethany Baldwin
    Missionary, Chi Alpha Campus Ministries,
    Flagstaff, AZ

    Brandon Wilkes

    Pastor, One Church,
    St. Louis, MO

    Chris Beard
    Pastor, Peoples Church, Cincinnati, OH

    Marcus Floyd
    Missionary, Chi Alpha Campus Ministries,
    Richmond, VA

    Mike Godzwa
    Missionary, Chi Alpha Campus Ministries,
    Richmond, VA

    Raydon and Kim Haskins
    Missionaries, Chi Alpha Campus Ministries,
    Terre Haute, IN

    Rigo Herrera
    Missionary, Chi Alpha Campus Ministries,
    Charlottesville, VA

    Sadell Bradley
    Pastor, New Life Covenant Church,
    Cincinnati, OH




    Our purpose is to help the church be an accurate representation of Christ's people to the campus in its: sacred creation (Acts17:26),
    diverse ethnic makeup (Rev. 7:9), supernatural oneness (Gal. 3:28), Jesus-centered unity(John 17:21), kingdom-ethic witness (Mt. 5:1-15, Luke 4:18-19) and reconciliation ministry(2 Cor. 5: 16-21, Eph. 2:14-22).

    We do this through: 
    1. Mobilizing the unsent* 
    2. Equipping through training and resourcing 
    3. Helping plant campus ministries at HBCU's** 
    4. Building cross-cultural bridges between believers & congregations 


    *Unsent refers to ethnic minorities traditionally under-represented in missions
    **Historically Black College and Universities


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