
Dr. Samantha Pinto - Associate Professor of African American Studies and English at Georgetown University
How First Generation, Black Feminist, Queer-Centered Perspectives Can Transition Your Scholarship, Teaching, and Service
Samantha Pinto (PhD in English, UCLA) teaches courses on African, African American, postcolonial, and feminist studies. Her book, Difficult Diasporas: The Transnational Feminist Aesthetic of the Black Atlantic (NYU Press, 2013), was the winner of the 2013 William Sanders Scarborough Prize for African American Literature and Culture from the MLA. She is currently completing a second book project on the relationship between 18th and 19th century black women’s celebrity and human rights, as well as working on another book-length project that explores the role of feminist ambivalence in modern political and cultural institutions.

Grevelin Ulerio - Undergraduate Student at Bucknell University
3 Ways to Thrive at a PWI (Predominantly White Institution)
Grevelin Ulerio is a junior at Bucknell University. She is double majoring in Psychology and Africana Studies. She was born and raised in the Bronx in New York City and hopes to use her future degree to impact communities that are similar to the one she was socialized in. She is first generation Dominican-American and first generation college student in her family.
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I'm an Associate Professor of Literacy and Language, African American Studies, and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at The Pennsylvania State University. I focus on dismantling supremacist patriarchies through research, teaching, and coaching. As a sociocultural literacist, I work to understand personal and public voices and stories to solve personal and public problems. I do this by researching the evolutionary nature and function of literacies and texts through the discourses of narrative research. My work exposes impetuses for various personal and social ills such as racism, sexism, and ableism.
I love to meditate way before dawn, work out like a soldier, and shop alone. I prefer rum to wine, jeans to skirts, and like my heels sky high (except when I'm wearing cowboy boots). Every year I ask my stylist to cornrow and bead my hair in homage to Patrice Rushen and Stevie Wonder (if you know of these artists and understand why demonstrating embodied respect for them is important, we can probably be friends). I believe in ghosts, fairies, and hobbits (for real). Musically, I vibe to old school everything (hip hop, R&B, jazz, rock, and classical) and especially dig Hildegard von Bingen. I trust children a little bit more than adults, respect teens for their fearlessness, admire elders for their tenacity, and occasionally prefer the company of dogs to people. I'm really getting into interior design and have a penchant for acquiring east coast real estate. I'm also a survivor of multiple terrors in love.
I invite you to learn more about me and the projects I am involved with at JeanineStaples.com.