To Be Black, Female, and Literate: A personal Journey in Education by Leonie C.R. Smith
"My education, whatever shape it took, would be a life-process and would become a tool with which I could do the necessary activist work in my community". -Leonie Smith
Leonie Smith, deriving from a family with little education, made it a life-long goal to become educated. Being a black woman from Antigue and then travelling to America forced her to face the struggles of forming a literacy as a Black American women, yet she did not get discouraged. Instead she worked hard to get to a point in her life were she felt her literacy was satisfactory to herself and at the potential she knew she had. The quote above reflects not only her transition from one form of education to another, but her willingness to view education as process that has no boundaries. Viewing literacy as a life-long process creates a continuing literacy of black women. Your literacy does not end once you learn how to read and write, but when you continue to learn and advance your knowledge. We should all view literacy as a life-long process.
In order for Smith to overcome the lack of knowledge in her family back in the carribean and the discouragement she felt in junior high and college, Smith had to know that as a black she women she had to become literate. Referring to the introduction by Kilgour Dowdy, as black women we represent our community. As Smith states in this quote, "..with which I can do the necessary activist work in my community". Becoming a black literate women should essentially be a benefit to our community.
-Courtney Sykes
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