“I am not African because I was born in Africa but because Africa was born in me.” –
Kwame Nkrumah
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THE CASE FOR EMOTIONAL REPARATIONS PART 2
By Enola G. Aird, CHN Founder and President
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According to the great James Baldwin, “People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them.”
Let’s talk about how to get ourselves out of the trap; and about why this year, 2019, is of singular importance to our escape.
Last month, I wrote about the fact that for 600 years, we, as people of African ancestry, have been living our lives according to a narrative written for us by Europeans to serve their interests. At the heart of that narrative is the lie of Black inferiority. The lie is what led to the profoundly negative stereotypes that cast Black people, and give other people permission to treat us, as “less than.”
Continue reading.
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2019 VALUING BLACK LIVES GLOBAL SUMMIT
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A Mass Emotional Emancipation Circle and Training of Facilitators
SAVE THE DATES–AUGUST 20, 21, AND 22, 2019. RICHMOND, VIRGINIA
The most powerful weapon formed against us as people of African ancestry was the lie of White superiority and Black inferiority. Four hundred years to the day after the forced arrival of “20 odd Africans” in the colony of Virginia, an event that would lead to the widespread trafficking of African human beings in the United States, we will come together to draw the line between a past shaped by the lie of Black inferiority and a future defined by the truth of Black humanity.
Because 400 years are more than enough.
Join us for what will be a mass training of Emotional Emancipation Circle Facilitators.
You will leave feeling renewed, inspired, and empowered with fresh insights and concrete emotional wellness skills to help reduce racial stress and trauma. So that you can serve as a catalyst for emotional emancipation, healing, wellness, and empowerment in your neighborhood and community.
Join us for a first-time Emotional Emancipation Circles Training or a Re-Training in the brand new Version 3.0 of the EE Circles Guide, with a heightened focus on how to live and teach the EE Circle Keys and emotional wellness skills.
For more information, email
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Community Healing Network and the Association of Black Psychologists are grateful to have been invited to bring the Truth Tour to Rochester, New York, and Pasadena, California.
Rochester, New York, May 31, June 1, and June 2, 2019.
Hosts: The Mental Health Association of Rochester and the City of Rochester.
Pasadena, California, June 3 and 4, 2019.
Host: Prototypes
Here’s what our hosts are saying:
Melanie Funchess, Director of Community Engagement, Mental Health Association of Rochester:
“Once I learned about the Truth Campaign and Tour, I knew that I had to find a way to bring it to Rochester. Having worked in this community with my people, people of African descent, for over 20 years it was clear to me that we, as community, needed a clarion call to healing. We needed to come together to acknowledge our need for healing and emotional emancipation from trauma, both historical and present. We needed to gain skills and tools for healing because we must be the owners of the tools of our own healing. This weekend is the beginning of a continued relationship with the Community Healing Network and the Association of Black Psychologists on our journey to healing [and] emotional emancipation. Following the training, we will deploy teams around the community to continue the work...”
Dara Griffin, Community Organizer, Prototypes:
“I am very excited that Pasadena has the opportunity to be part of the Global Truth Campaign and Tour. I felt compelled to arrange the EE Circle training in Pasadena after being inspired and hearing Dr. Grills and Dr. Rowe present at Loyola Marymont University. I am constantly looking for innovative ways to bring Black people together in safe emotional spaces to fellowship with each other and to heal. There’s two things for me, 1. the value in this training is simply bringing Black people together to continue the journey of healing. AND 2. the tag, it stuck with me, ‘defy the lie of white superiority and black inferiority.’ I trust that everyone attending the EE Circle training in Pasadena will commit to partnering with CHN, ABPsi, and local partners to start hosting EECs in and around the Pasadena area. There’s an up swell of positive energy focused on the needs of Black children and families here in the Pasadena area. I believe the Emotional Emancipation Circles will be an integral part of the movement to strengthen Black children and families here and to recognize the innate resilience that lies therein.”
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#ImAfricanBornIn: CHANGING OUR NARRATIVE TO CHANGE OUR TRAJECTORY
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CHN asked participants in our 2016 Valuing Black Lives Global Emotional Emancipation Summit (VBLS16) to share one simple action we could take together across the Diaspora to begin the work of rewriting our cultural narrative from one defined and driven by Europeans to one defined and driven by us.
A majority of panelists and participants voted for the idea offered by Kara Poole, of The Great Griot:
#ImAfricanBornIn_____#WeAreOne. These hashtags express the sentiments at the heart of the centuries-old Pan-African movement and are meant to support the many Pan-African initiatives already underway.
VBLS16 panelists and participants agreed that in order to begin to dismantle the European, anti-Black narrative, we, people of the Diaspora, must identify ourselves ever more closely with each other and with Africa—in effect seeing ourselves as one people, in many places, all rooted in Africa.
The work of rewriting the European, anti-Black, narrative must begin with Pan-Africanism. In enslaving African people and colonizing Africa, Europeans focused intently on disconnecting African people from each other and from Africa. We believe that reconnecting African people with each other and with Africa is crucial to dismantling the anti-Black narrative. Our coming together across the Diaspora is a powerful way to reject and defy that poisonous narrative.
Ours is a global struggle and in order to rewrite our narrative and change our trajectory—from surviving to flourishing—we must come together across the Diaspora. Our Global Action is therefore designed to promote greater Pan-African unity.
–Excerpted from CHN
We
Talk.
We
Tell.
We
Teach: Reclaiming Control of the Narrative Governing Our Lives, Communiqué and Call to Action. (Community Healing Network, 2017).
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TEXT "IDEFY" TO 228-28
TO DEFY THE LIE OF BLACK INFERIORITY AND EMBRACE THE TRUTH OF BLACK HUMANITY.
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Join us. Take the pledge to Defy the Lie of Black Inferiority and Embrace the Truth of Black Humanity.
Each pledge will make us stronger as a global African community.
Taking the pledge will make you part of a growing global culture of resistance that is standing up to—and that will ultimately extinguish—the lie.
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Join us. Visit communityhealingnet.org to help us create a culture of emotional emancipation, healing, wellness, and empowerment in families and neighborhoods across the African Diaspora–so that Black children everywhere can move beyond surviving to flourishing.
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LEGAL NOTICES:
Global Truth Campaign and Tour, Defy the Lie, Embrace the Truth, Emotional Emancipation Circles, EE Circles, EECs, Breathe, Baby, Breathe, Clearing the Way for Back Children to Flourish, and all related Community Healing Network copyrights, marks, and logos are owned exclusively–and stewarded–by Community Healing Network, Inc., and may not be used without its written permission. Local Global Truth Tour hosts and organizers, EEC facilitators, trainers, hosts, and organizers, and others in similar roles are wholly independent, and are not employees, agents, partners, or affiliates of Community Healing Network, Inc., or CHN's primary collaborator, the Association of Black Psychologists
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