Associate professor of psychology and Coordinator of African and African-American Studies, Buffie Longmire-Avital gave an invited talk titled, “'I Fought so Hard to Get Here?': Navigating Microaggressions in Historically White Spaces."
Buffie Longmire-Avital, associate professor of psychology and coordinator of African and African-American Studies, recently gave an invited address at the 13th Annual Skin of Color Society Scientific Symposium in Orlando, Florida.
The talk, delivered March 2 and titled “‘I Fought so Hard to Get Here?’: Navigating Microaggressions in Historically White Spaces,” integrated her current research on race-related stress, a component of racial battle fatigue, in racial minority college students with an overview on microaggressions, mental health risk, and coping strategies.
The talk was delivered at the annual symposium which highlights the emerging research on skin of color by dermatologists. The international medical conference brings medical students, residents, fellows and experts in dermatology together to examine skin health disparities for persons of color. The symposium also serves as a major mentoring and strategic planning vehicle for increasing the number of dermatologists from historically underrepresented ethnic groups in the field.
In addition to discussing the barriers students of color face in medical training programs regarding recruitment, retention, and career development, Longmire-Avital contextualized these findings within in a larger framework on health disparities and access to care.