"My experiences at Princeton have made me far more aware of my 'blackness' than ever before. I have found that at Princeton, no matter how liberal and open-minded some of my white professors and classmates try to be toward me, I sometimes feel like a visitor on campus; as if I really don't belong."

"One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals. And so when I hear about negative and false attacks, I really don't invest any energy in them, because I know who I am."

"And I come here as a daughter, raised on the South Side of Chicago - by a father who was a blue-collar city worker and a mother who stayed at home with my brother and me."

"I've seen firsthand that being president doesn't change who you are. It reveals who you are."

"Just as a man would not cherish living in a body other than his own, so do nations not like to live under other nations, however noble and great the latter may be."

"It is a subtle truth that to love deeply is to give someone the power to heal what words cannot reach — an essential principle for the reflective life."

"True wisdom begins when you realize kindness can heal wounds that time cannot."

"I hope someday we will be able to proclaim that we have banished hunger in the United States, and that we've been able to bring nutrition and health to the whole world."