Umuco Podcast Season III

#IAmYou


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Cate Underwood

Listen in as we chat with Cate Woodward, a senior at the American University, talk about her international travels and the important cultural lessons she took away from those experiences. Cate was exciting to talk with to and we can't wait for you to hear!


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Candace Megerssa

This week we spoke with Candace Megerssa, a senior at Cornell University studying Policy Analysis and Management, who shared with us her experience forming her own identity as a Black woman growing up in Atlanta and then transitioning to being a student at an Ivy League school. 


Season 3 Episode III

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Students of Life with Monika Dorniak

Monika Gabriela Dorniak is a German-Polish interdisciplinary artist, who draws upon her background in choreography, psychology, and fashion design along with her story of intergenerational trauma to create meaningful art. We had the pleasure of speaking with her to understand how she has mastered the art of taking trauma and making it into something positive.


Season 3 Episode II

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Helping Refugees isn’t Charity, It’s our Responsibility with Dr. Diya Abdo

Dr. Diya Abdo, a first-generation Palestinian Refugee originally born in Jordan and now an English Professor at Guilford College in North Carolina.  

As a person who was once a new American, Diya has taken on the responsibility of helping to make a new, welcoming home for others, and in particular, for the 12 million Syrians who have fled or been forced out of their home. Diya reflected, “The Syrian refugee crisis is not new. What was new about it was the incredible higher numbers— the highest we've seen in decades—and also the brutality of it that we saw visualized on the screen. We saw people…drowning in boats, I mean hundreds of people on a dinghy on a raft, you know that cannot handle that many people. People who are trying to cross deserts, and also perishing along the way, but we saw it right, we saw it visually. We saw that devastating footage." 


Season 3 Episode I

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Women Empowered, Humanity Empowered with Monica Singh

To kick-off season 3, Monica Singh shared with us her inspiring story of strength as an acid attack survivor and how she plans to use her passion for fashion to help other survivors.

Monica spoke to us about what it is like being a survivor, particularly as one with scars that are outwardly visible to everyone she meets. She reflected, “The physical harm is also included on top of the psychological and mental harm. If somebody asks us what happened to us, we cannot hide because our face is giving it all away.”