The other side of an [un]knocked door: A black girl’s Ph.D. journey

• In Event: Roundtable Session (Wednesday II)
  In Refereed Round-Table Session: Conceptualizing local and indigenous knowledge: exploring research approaches of three doctoral candidates in Tanzania, Thailand, and the United States

Proposal

Throughout my Ph.D. journey, I received help and strength from matriarchs, pioneers, mentors, sisters, those who saw potential, the Heritage Knowledge in Action (HeKA) Research Group, and my spiritual foundation to persist through my coursework, conference presentations, and publication submissions. This autoethnography ties my experiential context to my work, and the literature cited in [and through] my writing processes. By using writing as a method of inquiry, I explore the role that these elements play in my Ph.D. writing. Specifically, the following question will guide this inquiry: How does my community, personal experiences, and reading of the literature contribute to my Ph.D. journey? For this inquiry, I chose to use the Indigenous Knowledge of Ubuntu and Afrocentricity to frame the data collection and analysis of literature cited in my graduate studies, graduate school assignments, and reflections on my personal history. The findings from this study suggest that my family contributed to my Ph.D. journey and regardless of whether or not I obtained the degree, the lessons I learned from home influenced how I engaged with and reacted to the needs of people.

Getting on the road: Who knew everything I owned could fit in a Honda Accord Coupe? Of course, I had to leave behind the decades of papers, notebooks, and report cards saved from all grades; those alone would more than fill my trunk. You can find out what you are capable of when you are creative and determined; and when money is an object. Here I was seven months out of one master’s program and headed to another. Only this one was ten hours away from parents, brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, friends, and church family of 31 years. This new program was states away from home. Why leave everything when you have everything you need? You will leave everything when others need you. Who are these people that would pull you away from what you know? Well, their names and faces I had yet to encounter, but there was something only I could do to help them along the way. And, while I was gone, those whom I left behind would be okay because there would be others to fill my space. But why leave everything? The fact of the matter was that someone else did it for me. Here is the secret to this oxymoron, when your life is tied up to others, you are not your own. You are in place for others, and others are in place for you. But here is a word of caution, you cannot be everything to everyone, and no one should be everything to you. That upsets the balance because someone will not have a chance to play her part. These new exchanges were the results of old ones, but the road to a Ph.D. required me to change lanes to encounter those who needed me on this journey and those who would help me along the way.

Author

• Renee Jordan, Georgia State University