Simmons College

Dawna M. Thomas, Ph.D. is joint appointed in Africana Studies and Women's and Gender Studies department and also teaches courses in the Department of Multicultural First Year course: Culture Matters. She has taught classes on research methods, health and disability, and violence in the family. Her research work has focused on disability policy, economic disparities for individuals with disabilities from culturally diverse communities, community-based participatory research, race and gender disparities in health care, and disability service systems, and the development of cultural identity. Her doctoral work "Understanding Disability in the Cape Verdean Community: An Analysis of Race and Disability in Massachusetts"was the first conducted in the Cape Verdean on disability.

She is a co-founder of Common Threads a grassroots community cultural initiative dedicated to the preservation and celebration of the cultural and historical traditions of the Cape Verdean Diaspora in the United States and the transnational Cape Verdean Community. She has co-authored several publications in reference to: cultural relevancy in education, disability policy, and psychology. Currently she is working on a book Serving the Cape Verdean Community: Handbook on Cultural Understanding for Health Care Providers.

Dr. Thomas grew up in Boston's Roxbury neighborhood. She continues to live and work in the Roxbury Community against discrimination and towards social equality.