Culture, race and spirit: a reflective model for the study of African‐Americans

The author introduces a reflective model of racial, cultural and spiritual engagement for researchers and research participants in an attempt to guide them in the development of perhaps more empowering research about African‐Americans. The model focuses on three essential areas to help guide researchers and participants: the cultural self, the racial self and the spiritual self. Maintaining and centralizing these areas in the study of African‐Americans can be critical in developing empowering research that produces knowledge to inform theory, research and practice. The interrelated phases of reflection in the model are (a) researcher/participant racial and cultural identity reflection; (b) spiritual reflection; (c) history/literature on race, culture and spirit; and (d) situational context. After a review of the literature on the cultural, racial and spiritual line, the author introduces the model and concludes with examples of the model in practice.