Jasmine Guy (born March 10, 1964 in Boston, Massachusetts) is an American actress, singer and dancer. She is most well known for her starring role as Southern belle Whitley Gilbert in the television series A Different World.

Biography

Born to an African-American father and a white mother of Portuguese descent, Guy was raised in Atlanta, Georgia, where she attended the former Northside Performing Arts High School (which merged with North Fulton High School to form North Atlanta High School). Her mother's name is Jaye Rudolph, and her father, the Reverend William Guy, was pastor of the historic Friendship Baptist Church in Atlanta, which served as an early home to Morehouse College and Spelman College. (The latter school served as the setting for "Hillman College," the fictional school depicted in A Different World.) She later studied dance at Alvin Ailey American Dance Center in New York City in 1981.