My Guest, Alex Lodge, is a patent attorney, and over the years has devoted his time to pro bono work in order to make it easier for clients to raise themselves out of poverty. He was recently named the Pro Bono Attorney of the Year by the State Bar of Wisconsin's Legal Assistance Committee. Alex and I discuss a range of topics including mentorship, the importance of giving back to the community and why he went from being a trained research chemist to an Attorney. Read more about Alex Lodge

Growing up in the deep South, Coronda “Aku” Lee discusses her struggles of being raised with the southern culture with lack of black representations. Our conversation includes topic of code switching, fitting into the southern culture and the difficulties of making friends in different parts of America. Coronda received her Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and her Masters in Program Management from Colorado State University. She is currently the Medical Education Team Lead for Neurology Residency Program at VCU.

A native of Kingston, Jamaica, Annica joined the University of Iowa athletic staff as assistant athletic trainer in October, 2010 working with Women's Soccer and Softball. As a graduate of Central Florida University and Northern Iowa, she has been involved in many sports ranging from football, men's and women's tennis to baseball. A member of the National Athletic Trainers' Association, the Athletic Trainer's Association of Florida and the Southeastern Athletic Trainer's Association, Annica and I discuss her journey from Jamaica to Iowa, and the inspiration she received from a single mother. 

As a decorated dancer and instructor (specializing in Latin American style dancing), Modei Akyea brings rich perspective from his travels around the world. A gentle soul with soo much knowledge about dance and language, Modei and I talk through how dance and languages play in telling the black story. 

As a passionate supporter of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion initiatives, Harmon currently serves on Iowa’s DEI Accountability Board. As an advocate for social justice reform, she has been the keynote speaker for the CMU Multicultural Celebratory as well as the Liberty High School Diversity and Inclusion Series. Lastly, she has created a “brave space” within Iowa’s WBB program for Black student-athletes to share their experiences in an effort to amplify the voices of minority student-athletes within the athletic department. Harmon played on the Central Michigan University women’s basketball team from 2000-04. Majoring in Sports Studies, she earned her Bachelor’s degree in 2004. She earned her Master’s degree in Sports Administration from Wayne State in 2009. Our conversation in this episode dives into the mind of a trailblazer athlete turned coach and all the struggles that comes with it.

In this episode, I continue my discussion with Dean Wing on Multiplicative Identity and the concept of Othermothering.

"I noted the dual discriminations I felt as a black female. To me that discrimination was multiplicative, not additive. In other words, I was black times a woman every day, not black plus a woman, which implies you may be able to subtract an identity. The discrimination I felt was against me as a holistic black woman." 

Adrien Wing is the Associate Dean for International and Comparative Law Programs and the Bessie Dutton Murray Professor at the University of Iowa College of Law, where she has taught since 1987. Additionally, she serves as the Director of the University of Iowa Center for Human Rights, as well as Director of the France Summer Abroad Program. She has previously served as the Associate Dean for Faculty Development and the on-site Director for the London Law Consortium semester abroad program.

More about Dean Wing

The 6-3 center is agile and athletic with a tremendous work ethic. As a Nigerian native, Ugo is a 2016 Temple University master’s graduate with a degree in globalization and development communications. In college, she helped guide her team to the WNIT Elite Eight (2016) and the American Athletic Conference semifinals (2016). Nwaigwe played professionally overseas in Nigeria, Spain, Angola, Portugal, and Argentina and was a Nigerian National team member in 2016 and 2017. Ugo and I talk all things growing up Nigerian-America and the difficulties of adjusting as a Black athlete. 

Derek Kwadwo (D.K.) Nnuro is a Ghanaian-American fiction writer. He is a graduate of the fiction program at the Iowa Writers Workshop, where he was a recipient of the Meta Rosenberg Memorial Fellowship and a Teaching Writing Fellowship. He was awarded the Robert J. Schulze Fellowship in 2016 and is a recipient of a fellowship from the Ragdale Foundation.  In this episode we chat about the identities from DK's new novel, What Napoleon Could Not Do and his pursuit of the American Identity as a Black man.

As a specialist in business financial crime and financial crime compliance policies in the UK, my conversation with Trudy, a Ghanaian-Londoner focuses on the diplomatic nature of racism in Europe, specifically in the UK. We also discuss the topic of imposter syndrome as a black individual. 

Nana Ama Agyemang Asante is a Ghanaian journalist, editor and writer. She co-hosts the “Citi Breakfast Show” at the Accra-based radio station Citi FM. In 2015, she was named Radio Personality of the Year for your persistent efforts in speaking truth to power. 2017, she was awarded a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship by the National Endowment for Democracy. In this episode we chat about her travels and her views on the black culture in Ghana, US and the UK.