Karen Cummings-Lily, a graduate of the College of Social Work DSW program has done research on microaggression with Shandra Forrest-Bank, CSW Associate Professor and Director of the College of Social Work Office of Research and Public Service. Their work has been published in the June issue of the Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare.

Cummings-Lilly, Karen T. and Forrest-Bank, Shandra S. (2019) “Understanding Appalachian Microaggression from the Perspective of Community College Students in Southern West Virginia,” The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare: Vol. 46 : Iss. 2 , Article 5.

Recent scholarship on discrimination recognizes the importance of microaggression, small insults and slights experienced frequently by people from minority groups (Sue, et. al., 2007). Microaggression may be an especially insidious mechanism in the oppression of Appalachian people, since the derogatory stereotypes are broadly accepted while their oppressed status tends to not be acknowledged. This study applied qualitative focus group methodology to understand perceptions of microaggression and oppression among a sample of college students living in rural Central Appalachia.