Introducing: Yaba Amgborale Blay

Age: 32

Degree: Ph.D. in African American studies; graduate certificate in women's studies. Blay currently is a pre-doctoral fellow at Florida International University and is also a graduate fellow at the Institute for the Study of Race and Social Thought here at Temple.

Hometown: New Orleans. Her family is originally from Ghana and she is part of the first generation of her family born in the United States.

Title of Dissertation: “Yellow Fever: Skin Bleaching and the Politics of Skin Color in Ghana.”

Why I’m interested in skin-bleaching: “My mother’s sister died at 58. She was sick for a year, went to various clinics, had dementia and was dead within a year. I noticed that she had lighter skin than the rest of our family. It turned out that for most of her adult life, she had been bleaching her skin. It was the first time I had ever heard of it.”

What I found: “There’s a high incidence of skin bleaching all over the world among people of color. I collected data from 2003 to 2005 while serving as the Faculty Assistant to Dr. Abu Abarry and the Temple in Ghana program. I did 43 interviews with people who bleached, people who didn’t, and government officials. About 30 percent of the population bleaches in Ghana. In Ghana, it’s can be linked with both traditional and colonial symbolisms of embodied whiteness.”

How I’m making the world more aware: “I’m hoping to publish it as a book and to present a more concise document to Ghanaian officials. The government says that they’ve never addressed the issue because no one has ever brought it their attention. I hope to work with the authorities on this.”

What’s next: “I’m hoping to secure an assistant professorship in African-American and women and gender studies."