Myah Balaporia, FCLC 2025

MAJOR: Psychology

BIO: I am passionate about making small changes worldwide, especially concerning mental health. In the future, I hope to be a counselor for young adults who have been through a traumatic event in their lives, and I hope to help them learn how to deal with these events and incorporate them into their lives rather than have them forget about them and move on. With this project, I emphasize the importance of storytelling and how it opens people’s perspectives.

PROJECT TITLE: Racism: Psychological and Spiritual Impacts on Young Adults and Their Sense of Belonging

MENTOR: Dr. Stephanie Arel, Department of Theology

ABSTRACT: “Racial trauma, a form of race-based stress, refers to People of Color and Indigenous individuals’ (POCI) reactions to dangerous events and real or perceived experiences of racial discrimination” (Comas-Diaz, Hall, and Neville, 2019).

This project emerged from a class integrating sacred texts and trauma. The first version of the project explores how young adults who have experienced racism articulate its impact on their sense of belonging. The project acknowledges that racial trauma affects people's ability to accept themselves. Racial trauma provokes talks with parents about the need to hide certain parts of the self or share things differently amongst certain people. Questions emerge. Those who have experienced racialized trauma ask themselves, “Was I chosen because I am colored, or was it because my work is genuinely good?” “Was I not chosen because I am colored or because my work genuinely sucks?”

The project explores these complicated questions through interviews with five Fordham students. I asked each participant what tools they use to cope psychologically and spiritually with racism, what advice they would give their younger selves or younger kids like them, and what has helped them manage their personal experiences of racism. The appended video is the documentary that resulted. The extension of the project, and what I am proposing here, includes 1) wide distribution of the current video and 2) an additional taped roundtable with Fordham students who identify as having differently colored skin (than white skin) to be appended to the current film for entrance into film festivals. 

Both videos offer education and insight into what it’s like to live with differently colored skin. Sharing the videos also communicates that those who have experienced racism are not alone. The proposed round table discussion with the participants and other volunteers further supports those who have experienced racism. The roundtable includes discussion leaders, a religious leader, and a therapist, who guide selected speakers through sharing what helped them with racialized trauma, including what they wished they had known when they were younger. Questions for these conversations will be planned. Then, the leaders moderate a broader discussion with the larger group. The roundtable 1) offers insight into how religion and spirituality help survivors of this trauma and 2) provides tools to help survivors.

Awareness of these internal conflicts helps my target group and the people who see the videos.