This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, April 4, 2011 - We must begin to understand why some African Americans exhibit some detrimental behaviors or the community will continue to be marginalized. As unbelievable as this may sound, African Americans are still reeling from the effects of slavery.
It's true that the vestiges of 300 years of physical and psychological brutality, plus another 100 years of legalized and enforced segregation, dictated the social order of the United States and the systemic racism that still lingers. Racism and ongoing oppression haunt us today. Yet, those things don't fully explain, nor get to the causal effects of learned behaviors that meant African American's survival then, but impede us from healing the wounds of slavery.
Here's a topic we should all learn, understand and wrap our minds around: The Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome. It's a subject presented by Joy DeGruy Leary, a social scientist and author of a book of the same title. She proposes that African Americans today suffer from a particular kind of intergenerational trauma.
DeGruy asserts that no one can be truly liberated while living under the weight of oppression. She traces how overt and subtle forms of racism have damaged the collective African-American psyche. It is subsequently manifested through poor mental and physical health, family and relationship dysfunctions and self-destructive impulses.
We see it manifested in positive and negative ways within the African-American community. For example, many African Americans "speak," that is they acknowledge each other as a sign of respect, when passing by or entering a room. On the other hand, there are negative ramifications of enslaved people. Many African Americans have been socially acculturated to whip children, judge good and bad hair types and favor "fair" skin. These things have persisted even though the circumstances from which they were developed have not.
DeGruy explains that "The systematic dehumanization of African slaves was the initial trauma, and generations of their descendants have borne the scars." This dehumanization has had an effect on the total community. The impact of this intergenerational trauma to African Americans remains significant, yet with more understanding, we can have positive change. African Americans can begin to heal from the harm that was committed during slavery and break the patterns of internalized oppression. African American individually can heal, as can communities and children. Everyone regardless of race, gender or class would benefit from this healing process.
Amy Hunter is director of Racial Justice for YWCA Metro St. Louis.