[Piano begins playing] [Dr. Anika L. Hines] Hi, I am Dr. Anika Hines, I'm a native of North Virginia; a Baltimore implant for my greater adult life; and I am in the fight to achieve health equity for marginalized people through research and through sharing their stories. [Piano music fades] Entering the hallowed halls of Johns Hopkins was what I’d dreamed of even when I didn’t quite understand the weight of earning a PhD. As a child, I had read books about medical triumphs conducted by doctors at Johns Hopkins and participated in a program sponsored by what was known as the “Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth.” I honestly had little understanding of what it would take to complete the degree as a first-generation college graduate. Not to mention, I had not made the Johns Hopkins-Baltimore geographical connection. Childhood trips to Baltimore with my best friend’s family had sealed in my mind that Baltimore was not an “easy” or “fun” place to live. What I remembered most from then was a certain level of aggression associated with living in Baltimore. Now, as an adult, I didn’t know if I would have what it would take to cut it. I soon came to learn that the dissonance I perceived between Johns Hopkins and its surrounding East Baltimore community was real and intentional. There were two Baltimores—stratified by race and class—and not in ways that I was used to as a daughter of southeastern Virginia. I found myself living and working in both. I was a student at the city’s most prestigious institution and a Black woman who could easily be mistaken for a “local” (and barred access) if I didn’t prominently display my ID. For example, I was questioned on a university shuttle by security, who thought that I was a non-Hopkins affiliate just trying to hitch a ride. Encounters such as this created a heightened vigilance in me to assure my belonging. Then, I understood the “Baltimore aggression.” As I lived, worked, and prayed in the city, I came to understand its citizens as strong, hardworking, loyal, unpretentious, and appropriately, precautious. Thankfully, I met mentors and friends along the way—personally and professionally— who enriched my life, showed me the way, and helped me to grow. So, I engaged my work through the lens that Black Baltimore was not aggressive yet oppressed. The only way to live through a system of factors mounting against you—as they are for Baltimore citizens, is to have a fighting spirit. That is Baltimore’s charm. Within the context of my work to understand chronic stress and racism as a driver of racial disparities in chronic disease, I aim to center the voices of those that are least likely to be heard. The photo-voice methodology does that through placing cameras in the hands of those whose lived experiences we hope to learn. I previously used photo-voice to investigate the food environment among Black residents of Baltimore. Residents described physical and social features of the food environment as well as perceptions of its origins and holistic and generational health effects. They concluded that the conditions of the food environment were because of structural racism—unfair and intentional policies that created inequities. We used the data to moderate a stakeholder meeting with community organizations and policy makers to plan actionable solutions. When offered the opportunity to apply photo-voice methodology to amplify the voices of community health workers— healthcare’s unsung heroes—on a national platform alongside Dr. Lisa A. Cooper—my research mentor since graduate school and my graduate school best friend—Dr. Chidinma A. Ibe—I jumped at the opportunity. I am simply amazed by the bridging role that community health workers play between the two Baltimores that I have come to know: healthcare and Black Baltimore. That's the bridge that my portrait represents. Community health workers fill so many gaps in healthcare while being subject to the same systemic inequities for which they serve as advocates to others. I suppose that I am also a bridge of sort. In hindsight, I am as grateful for the university shuttles that pass me by because I didn't look like one of Hopkins' own as I am for professors and classmates who embrace me and my ideas. While before I thought of it as a burden, I know now that this dual existence is a superpower.