Dance Movement Therapy Commons^™

Voice From The Deep: A Black Student's Journey In A Dance/Movement Therapy Graduate Program, Aqueena H. Smith

Creative Arts Therapies Theses

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the author’s experience in a dance/movement therapy program through poetry written while in graduate school. The author uses the methodologies of lyric/poetic inquiry, artistic inquiry, and autoethnography to structure this thesis research. The thesis provides affirmation that cultural background and faith affect the perspective of an individual’s experience in graduate school. Data analysis of eighteen poems written by the author revealed themes as the results of this study. The author discusses the meaning and significance of these poems that communicate the graduate experience as a whole.