WSSU professor Michele Lewis awarded a Fulbright Grant
Winston-Salem State University professor of psychological sciences Dr. Michele K. Lewis has been named a 2023-2024 Fulbright Canada Distinguished Chair in Arts and Social Sciences in Canada and North America.
Lewis will be hosted by the Feminist Institute of Social Transformation (FIST) at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario. FIST is an institute that houses women and gender studies and interdisciplinary faculty. Students may also pursue minor concentrations there in sexuality studies, disability studies, and critical race studies. The goal of FIST is to recognize both the historic and ongoing harms of social injustice and systemic oppression. FIST's objective centers creating positive social changes. Lewis’s research as a Fulbright Distinguished Chair is entitled Black “LGBTQ+” Psychology: Understanding collective self-determination, Afrocentrism and optimal identity.”
At WSSU Lewis teaches courses in black psychology, brain and behavior, and motivation and emotions. Her classes focus on “how our minds, behavior, emotions and brains are culturally shaped by intersectional experiences".
Lewis is a member of the Association of Black Psychologists and is trained in facilitating Emotional Emancipation Circles (EEC). These circles “are not therapy or counseling. They are safe spaces to talk about experiences, mistruths, and untruths about identity for people of African descent that leads to taking positive action,” Lewis said. Her work as a Fulbright scholar will use the Afrocentric methodology of EECs, revised for use with LGBTQ+ people of African descent from the United States and Canada. Ten participants from each country will be recruited for a joint virtual experience. Lewis will also actively engage with FIST's intellectual life while on the campus of Carleton University.
The field of Black/African-centered psychology centers a positive psychology approach, “the field is about a system of thought and action that examines processes that allow for the illumination and liberation of the spirit; it can be used to resolve problems and to promote optimal functioning for all humans." Lewis acknowledges that "traditional psychology departments around the world use the Eurocentric worldview of studying humans, which is different from what I do; FIST's work is a better fit for my research than a traditional psychology department. I'm pleased that FIST is welcoming me and supportive of my project."
In 2018 WSSU’s Center for the Study of Economic Mobility (CSEM) funded Lewis' Emotional Emancipation Circles research with lower-income Black women in Winston-Salem. This led to two chapters in her book, Our Biosocial Brains, and understanding the women's interests in contributing positively to their community and increased opportunities for continuously supporting each other's families.
