Tagged With "Loss of Cultural Identity Part"
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Fearing Coronavirus, Many Rural Black Women Avoid Hospitals to Give Birth at Home (PEW TRUST)
By April Simpson, April 18, 2020, PEW Trust Black women are two to three times more likely to die from causes related to pregnancy than white women, regardless of income or education. Black midwives could be part of the solution, especially during the coronavirus pandemic, but restrictions on midwifery make it difficult to practice in many states. Pregnant women in Tennessee, Arkansas and Mississippi have been calling nonstop to CHOICES Midwifery Practice in Memphis, but the center is...
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TEACHER VOICE: Breaking the school-to-prison pipeline with ‘windows and mirrors’ for black boys [hechingerreport.org]
The connection I’m building with my students starts every day with a box of Cocoa Puffs. Name-brand cereal may not sound all that special, but it’s something most of my students can’t afford. It’s something I remember longing for when I was a kid. Even though our school serves breakfast in the classroom to all students, I bring a group of boys from our K-4 school together for a special breakfast to fuel their day with a dose of self-esteem. We eat and we talk, and they get to start their day...
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12 Myths of the Science of ACEs
The two biggest myths about ACEs science are: MYTH #1 — That it’s just about the 10 ACEs in the ACE Study — the CDC-Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences Study . It’s about sooooo much more than that. MYTH #2 — And that it’s just about ACEs…adverse childhood experiences. These two myths are intertwined. The ACE Study issued the first of its 70+ publications in 1998, and for many people it was the lightning bolt, the grand “aha” moment, the unexpected doorway into a blazing new...
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Be Part of The League of Extraordinary People
You are extraordinary. Writing this post feels like I have come full circle. In April of 2019, Alfred White reached out to me on ACEs Connection. Shortly after, we spoke at length about the plans he had to create a place of healing and hope in Federal Way and King County, Washington, specifically for individuals with a history of trauma and who were now impacted with symptoms such as addiction and homelessness. I recall sharing with Alfred that there was such a need for this in that...
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California's 1st Surgeon General Spotlights Health Risks Of Childhood Adversity (npr.org)
In an interview last year, after her book , The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity, was published, Burke Harris told NPR's Cory Turner, "We all need to be part of the solution. If we each take ... our little piece, it's nuts how far we'll be able to go, together as a society, in terms of solving this problem. California Gov. Gavin Newsom took Burke Harris up on her challenge, appointing her the first-ever surgeon general of California. Newsom cites the toxic...
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How I Can Offer Reparations in Direct Proportion to My White Privilege (yesmagazine.org)
I had a fascinating breakfast conversation with my 11-year-old daughter a few days back. The nigh before I had a fitful dream - one that was short on plot and imagery, but chock-full of emotion. In this case, the feeling was of a deep, immovable sorrow. When I awoke, it didn't take long to recognize that the article I'd been working on - this article - was definitely working on me, too. During breakfast I knew my daughter could tell I wasn’t on solid ground. She’s a sensitive soul, and I...
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Black Alabama lawmakers share negative encounters with law enforcement (WHNT.com)
By Reshad Hudson, June 8, 2020, WHNT. MONTGOMERY, Ala. (WIAT) — As protest play out across the state in hopes to end racial injustice, some Alabama lawmakers are sharing their own stories of injustice. State Representatives Jeremy Gray, Chris England and Anthony Daniels say their stories are like so many other Alabamians. “Just being a normal citizen, and then you have these encounters, which will whether you call it racism, whether you call it with law enforcement,” said Rep. Gray.
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A short history of black women and police violence (The Conversation)
By Keisha N. Blain, June 12, 2020, The Conversation. Just after midnight on March 13, 2020, Breonna Taylor , an EMT in Louisville, Kentucky, was shot and killed by police officers who raided her home. The officers had entered her home without warning as part of a drug raid. The suspect they were seeking was not a resident of the home – and no drugs were ever found. But when they came through the door unexpectedly, and in plain clothes, police officers were met with gunfire from Taylor’s...
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Returning to the Great Mother to Heal Historical Trauma
My early life was defined by deep emotional pain and turmoil. In exchange for all that I endured, I was gifted reunification with the Motherland. As a young person, I stood on the same shore where my ancestors lost their freedom as the clear blue ocean water licked my feet and enticed me with her beauty. It was an anointing. Finally, I was home. For the past 27 years, I have been deeply submerged in West African culture. Throughout that time, I have lived on and off the Continent; spending...
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With rolling protest, Black Montrealers denounce the challenge of 'driving while Black' (CBC News)
By Claire Loewen, July 6, 2020, CBC News. Convoys of luxury and other vehicles driven by Black drivers hit the streets of Montreal Sunday as part of a demonstration to denounce racial profiling, and to bring awareness to the phenomenon of "driving while Black," in which members of the Black community are frequently stopped by police. Kenrick McRae, whose racial profiling complaint led to a police ethics committee decision in December that found two Montreal officers acted unlawfully when...
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Does Your Organization Unconsciously Operate with a White Supremacy Culture? 4 White Supremacy Culture Scenarios
As we endure the pain of lost loved ones, manage the anxiety of financial insecurity and potentially fret over becoming ill, it is a brilliant time for change in our country and around the world. There is a special kind of racist exclusion in America. When I took my young son to live in India, initially, he struggled everyday on the bus to school. There was a lot of hazing and bullying from older students. I remember him begging me to please take him to school in a rickshaw so that he didn’t...
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Loss of Cultural Identity Part 1; HUGE Number of Blacks in America Carry Slave Names
Over the next few days, I am going to provide a little food for thought about the loss of cultural identity that has profoundly impacted Africans across the Diaspora. Remember that the descendants of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade that live off of the Continent, are perhaps the only collective in the world that does not know their origin. We are African, but Africa is a continent of fifty-two countries with thousands of different cultures and dialects. Today’s micro-discussion is on names.
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Loss of Cultural Identity Part 2; Illegal to Practice Traditional Religion in Benin Republic, West Africa until 1992
Over the next few days, I am going to provide a little food for thought about the loss of cultural identity that has profoundly impacted Africans across the Diaspora. Remember that the descendants of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade that live off of the Continent, are perhaps the only collective in the world that does not know their origin. We are African, but Africa is a continent of fifty-four countries with thousands of different cultures and dialects. Today’s micro-discussion is on...
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Reclaiming African Herbalism as an Act of Resistance (yesmagazine.org)
I was fairly new to the study of plant medicine when I was introduced to herbalist Sade Musa, who leads the community education and healing project Roots of Resistance . Part of my commitment to self-care and reducing harm meant getting in touch with Mother Earth and learning to seek her out in moments of overwhelm, but it was frustrating that most of the traditions I was being introduced to were European or repackaged indigenous practices. I was starting to feel like the only way to get in...
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This wasn't the first time
Going out to buy groceries, going out for a walk, driving your kid back home from school. For most people these activities are normal, everyday things with little to no excitement, as they should be. Unfortunately, getting food, exercising, and supporting my son’s education have been a little more out of the ordinary for me. You see, I am a Mexican Indigenous man, brown skin, shaved head. My ethnicity and physical appearance are by no means unusual, especially in the part of the country...
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The Shadow Behind Black Mothers and Their Sons (NYT)
By Christian Drake, August 4, 2020, NYT. My son is 4 years old. He is funny and charming and naughty in the most delightful ways possible. He is the perfect host, making sure we understand and enjoy every part of his world. Recently, he has been waiting for a letter from his best friend at school — they have been writing back and forth to stay connected during the quarantine. As we walk down the driveway to the mailbox, he stops without my asking at the exact place where the driveway apron...
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Freedom From Trauma – Powerful & Profound Practices To Heal Trauma & Consciously Create The Body, Mind, Spirit You Truly Desire
We are living in complicated and stressful times. What needs to be healed seems more palpable than ever. It feels like the call to release what no longer serves has never been louder and we are feeling that tug at our core. While the founder of The League of Extraordinary People, Alfred White, has been gaining more clarity everyday on this, he was invited to be part of an event, more like a movement, to help others find freedom from what has been holding them back. It is a free, online...
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Policy and System Change (racialequitytools.org)
Source: https://www.racialequitytools.org/act/strategies/policy-and-system-change Policy, as used here, refers to the laws and regulations that govern major systems, including health, education, criminal justice, education and so on. Individuals are deeply and directly affected by policies and systems, including the laws and regulations themselves. They are also deeply and directly affected by unequal application by race/ethnicity of common policies and laws, and by unequal consequences by...
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My Story
My story began as I was born to an unwed African American teen mother. She had my brother when she was 14 and had me at the age of 16. I vaguely remember the house that I was born in down south. Blacks were not allowed to be born in the hospital at that time so we made use of midwives. My grandfather shot my dad twice in the back with a 22 caliber handgun. He was chasing him away from our house because he told him to stay away from my mother. Shortly thereafter we were kicked out of the...
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Youth-Led Advocacy Creates Healing Opportunities in Baltimore City
After a shooting at a historic Baltimore high school in February 2019—a 25-year-old man, angry about the school’s treatment of his sister, who was a student there, shot a special education assistant with a Smith and Wesson handgun—conversation in the city centered on whether school resource officers should be armed. Students said that was the wrong question. When City Council’s education and youth committee, chaired by council member Zeke Cohen, held hearings on school violence following the...
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COVID, ACES, and Radical Self-Care
COVID, ACES and Radical Self-Care Dr. LateshIa Woodley, LPC, NCC & Alexis Kelly, MPA COVID Thursday, March 13, 2020, I woke up thinking I love my life, I have the best job in the world, I get to wake up every day and strive to make a difference in the lives of students and families. Little did I know that a few hours later my life, the lives of my family, and the lives of the families that I serve would forever be changed due to the COVID pandemic. Prior to the pandemic, I was leading...
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Decolonizing Environmentalism (yesmagazine.org)
The exclusion of Indigenous people and other non-White communities in environmental and conservation work is, unfortunately, nothing new. For centuries, conservation has been driven by Eurocentric, Judeo-Christian belief structures that emphasize a distinct separation of “Man” and “Nature”—an ideology that does not mesh well with many belief structures, including those belonging to Indigenous communities. Before the onset of such religion through colonialist conquests, the overwhelming...
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Black Americans are forced to operate our entire lives in battle mode. It's utterly exhausting. [nytimes.com]
By Nathan McCall, The New York Times, November 23, 2020 Decades ago, when I was a teenager growing up in Portsmouth, Va., my buddies and I constantly railed against the evils of “the system.” We viewed the system as a vast, amorphous establishment that worked to preserve White privilege and control Black folks’ lives. It was the 1970s, and as proof that our hatred of the White mainstream was justified, we had to look no further than our homes. We saw that our parents were beaten down,...
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Black Lives Matter 13 Guiding Principles (DC Area Educators for Social Justice)
1. Restorative Justice We are committed to collectively, lovingly and courageously working vigorously for freedom and justice for Black people and, by extension all people. As we forge our path, we intentionally build and nurture a beloved community that is bonded together through a beautiful struggle that is restorative, not depleting. 2. Empathy We are committed to practicing empathy; we engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts. 3. Loving Engagement We...
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Rewriting the Story of Race in Appalachia (yesmagazine.org)
Dr. Enkeshi El-Amin, a researcher, lecturer, and cultural worker at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and William Isom, director of the Black in Appalachia project at East Tennessee PBS, were searching for the project to collaborate on that would help share their passion and research on the Black Appalachian experience. So, in 2019, when PRX—the Public Radio Exchange—began accepting applications for podcast pitches, Isom and podcast producer Chris Smith approached El-Amin about...
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Amanda Gorman left Anderson Cooper absolutely speechless in her post-Inauguration interview(upworthy.com)
Anderson Cooper has interviewed hundreds of people, from top celebrities to heads of state to people on the street. He is fairly unflappable when it comes to chatting with a guest, which is what makes his reaction while interviewing inaugural poet Amanda Gorman all the more delightful. Gorman stole the show at President Biden's Inauguration with a powerful performance of her original poem, "The Hill We Climb." People were blown away by both her words and her poise in delivering them,...
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Employee Impact: Making Health Care More Equitable for the African American/Black Communities of Portland (CAMBIA)
February 2, 2021 This post is part of a series that highlights Cambia’s unique Board Placement program, which works to match company employees with nonprofit organizations looking to grow their board of directors. A key part of the company’s Corporate Social Responsibility approach to giving, the board placement program has become one of the most impactful ways Cambia strengthens local communities and supports employees in their own volunteerism. North by Northeast Community Health Center...
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Resources for Teaching About Race and Racism With The New York Times [nytimes.com]
A curated collection of over 75 lesson plans, writing prompts, short films and graphs relating to racism and racial justice. By Nicole Daniels , Michael Gonchar and Natalie Proulx March 4, 2021 The summer of 2020 was not the first time that urgent conversations about race and racism were happening in homes, classrooms and workplaces. But the energy of the Black Lives Matter protests, believed by many to be the largest in U.S. history , was unparalleled. Though the demands and chants may have...
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Anti-Racism Resources List
Racial Trauma, Historical Trauma & Healing 44 Mental Health Resources for Black People Trying to Survive in This Country www.self.com ACEs Connection ACEs Science & Racism Resources Center 3 Realms of ACEs ACEs & African Americans Community on ACEs Connection ACEs teach us why racism is a health equity Issue: Dr. Flojaune Cofer (Part One) Racing ACEs Gathering & Reflections; If it's not racially just; it's not trauma-informed Adverse Community Experiences and Resilience: A...
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A Witness to the Tulsa Massacre, and a Family History Forever Altered (nytimes.com)
Anneliese M. Bruner was in her mid-30s when her father presented her with a small red book. It was bound in cloth and worn at the corners. “This is a book your grandmother wrote,” he told her, “and I want you to see what you can do with it. You are the matriarch of the family now, and I’m giving this to you.” Opening it, she saw a panoramic photograph that revealed the utter destruction of the Greenwood District in Tulsa, Okla. , in the immediate aftermath of a white mob descending on the...
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Why Society Must Address Intersectional Discrimination (aspeninstitute.org)
What should every American know? This question has long been debated, discussed, and deliberated. And while answers need to come from all of us—not just a powerful few—young people have often been excluded from these conversations. A partnership between Chicago Public Schools and the Aspen Institute’s program on Citizenship and American Identity aims to change that. Together they seek to elevate youth perspectives, beliefs, and values as vital to our national conversation of civic purpose.
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Children’s Author Tells the True Story of Columbus’ Exploits (yesmagazine.org)
For generations, Indigenous communities in the United States have protested Columbus Day—a centuries-old observance in the United States—and for decades have led a movement to rename the second Monday in October from “Columbus Day” to “Indigenous Peoples Day.” Today, more than a dozen states have formally embraced Indigenous Peoples Day as part of a process to recenter Indigenous communities and end the glorification of settler colonialism. Precisely within this context, educator and author...
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Historical Trauma Specialist Certification Level-1
HEAL HISTORICAL TRAUMA & Iya Affo PRESENT: The Historical Trauma Specialist Certification- Level 1 is a comprehensive understanding of Historical Trauma from a multicultural lens. The training is designed for participants serving, leading, advocating and working with people of color. It is the perfect training for people in a variety of disciplines as well as multicultural families and for anyone with the desire to understand the impact of slavery, genocide and colonization. The course...
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The Launch of Heal Trauma Global: Culturally Attuned Trauma Training
Being Trauma-Informed means that we are Culturally Attuned. Heal Trauma Global is a sister company to Heal Historical Trauma and was cultivated to fill a wide gap in stress science & trauma training. The trauma-informed movement is beautiful! It's wonderful that as a society we are moving in a direction that honors an individual's past as part of the driving force behind current behaviors. Yet, time and time again, I have attended trainings that are labeled as Trauma-Informed only to...
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Some teachers alarmed by Florida civics training approach on religion, slavery (tampabay.com)
Several South Florida high school educators are alarmed that a new state civics initiative designed to prepare students to be “virtuous citizens” is infused with a Christian and conservative ideology after a three-day training session in Broward County last week. Teachers who spoke to the Times/Herald said they don’t object to the state’s new standards for civics, but they do take issue with how the state wants them to be taught. “It was very skewed,” said Barbara Segal, a 12th-grade...
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American Nurses Association Issues Apology For History Of Racism (binnews.com)
Photo : Getty Images The American Nurses Association (ANA) has issued an apology for the organization's history of racism against Black nurses . Last week, the ANA released a racial reckoning statement to acknowledge its past actions and apologize to nurses of color. “Our intention with this statement is to publicly identify and acknowledge our past actions while addressing the harms that continue today,” the racial reckoning statement reads in part, per the Atlanta Journal-Constitution .
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Our Ancestors Knew; African American Journey of Historical Trauma
Standing on top of Ogun Mountain, in the Sacred City of 41 Mountains, West Africa, I knew my life would forever change. The women from the royal house danced for me. The men drummed me into a trance. They called me by my African name as they welcomed me home. On the soil of my ancestors, the healing began. I am a black woman born in the 1970’s. Nine generations ago, my ancestors were on the continent of Africa inhabiting the Kingdom of Dahomey. We were thriving. Unbeknownst to most, we were...
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Black Joy in Pursuit of Racial Justice (yesmagazine.org)
Author: TRACEY MICHAE’L LEWIS-GIGGETTS article, Black Joy in Pursuit of Racial Justice I’ve been longing to talk about all the ways in which these last couple of years have been so much of a gift for me. And yet I struggle with holding that fact in the same space with all the ways these last couple of years have challenged the very core of who I am as a human being and the way I navigate this world as a Black woman. And yet, in writing my book Black Joy: Stories of Resistance, Resilience,...
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Re: Loss of Cultural Identity Part 1; HUGE Number of Blacks in America Carry Slave Names
Thanks for thinking about this topic. Every time I face this, I find it difficult to contain my emotions, and looking at how many people lose their identity, I reflect on how to help them. As a teacher, I try to deal with these issues with children. We discuss and analyze essays about American Identity at the link so that children form their own vision on this matter. It’s more complicated with adults, so I try to talk about this problem in my lessons, and I hope that children’s...