The American Experience 5

Bellarmine University

Sarah Botha went on exchange to Bellarmine University in Kentucky, USA over our second semester of 2009.  This is her story!

If you want a small school experience where everyone knows your name and go above and beyond the call of being friendly, then Bellarmine is the place for your study abroad experience. I look back at my time at Bellarmine University and am amazed at the opportunities I was given, like acting in plays or writing my own column, and the friends I made.

Located in the north of Kentucky this small school is less southern hospitality and more a melting pot of all influences from the north, south and western areas of America ensuring a much more diverse and interesting people experience. And it’s this diverse experience that I especially take back from this adventure. With smaller classes I found myself challenged more by the more intimate atmosphere where students were encouraged to learn through debate rather than just textbook. As the only South African or even representative from the African continent, I was both challenged both by people’s questions about South Africa as well as being proud of the opportunity to transform people’s attitudes and prejudices towards this country. At Bellarmine I found a voice as well as a greater appreciation for South Africa.

Aside from my own personal lessons, I also found a home at Bellarmine with more of a sense of community that I’d ever experienced before. The slogan “Made into a Knight” becomes the mantra behind the dances, the basketball games and even the residence hall activities. The slogan becomes a declaration of everything you’re encouraged to aspire too. What I realized about Bellarmine that instead of trying to turn you into just another number, Bellarmine actively tries to engage with you as a student. My memories from some of the events like dances or basketball games or the house parties are some of my best ones.

Sarah and Friends

One thing that most of my friends asked me when I told them where I was studying was “Why Kentucky?” Never mind my friends from back home asking this but even my friends in Kentucky were puzzled as to why I would choose to study there. And in truth, other than visions of the old South with Scarlette O’Hara moments aplenty- I’m not entirely sure what drew me here. When I asked the other International students, also studying at Bellarmine, why they chose to come there they all had this to say; that they didn’t. There is something about the environment that encourages an appreciation of other languages, cultures and values. I think that this attitude is so needed not only in America but in other places in the world too. Aside from challenging stereotypes like, “If you’re from Africa, why are you white?” (Yes this actually happened to me). The more that I was at Bellarmine the more I realized what a privilege it is to be able to see other countries never mind being able to study there. And that for many people college is the first time that they’ve encountered people with a different set of cultural norms and values. And even being in America, which I didn’t think would be so different, challenged my own way of understanding the world.

So why Kentucky? Because if you want to understand a country sometimes places like New York or Los Angeles won’t help in explaining the impact of the Health Care debate or even how religion and politics collide here. I never wanted the glamorized version of America.
Instead I wanted to mingle with the people who help to represent the real America - fast food obsession included. Understanding this helped me to be able bring a different perspective on America, that challenges the stereotype, to South Africa.