Publisher's Synopsis
Trauma (trah-muh) n. a painful emotional experience, and its lasting psychic effect. ********** A gun in the hands of a young brother, pointed at another young brother, finger on the trigger, hatred in his eyes. This is trauma. A needle in the arm of a Black man, wasting away in a fog of hopelessness and regret. This is trauma. The fear a mother feels every time her sons leave the house. This is trauma. The young sister, convinced that her greatest asset is between her legs, and evaluates men in terms of profit and loss. This is trauma. The professional brother or sister, financially successful, determined to give their kids everything that they themselves never had, convinced that money will take the pain away. This is trauma. The talk with your child about the do's and don'ts of interacting with the police, hoping that it saves their life. This is trauma. The toxic relationship, two broken people seeking wholeness in each other. This is trauma. The misguided brother, attempting to affirm his manhood through violence, money, material possession, and sexual conquests. This is trauma. **********
Trauma in the African American Community is a very real and deep-seated psychological, emotional and spiritual issue amongst our people. It affects all aspects of our lives and relationships; it informs our decisions; and it colors our perception of the world around us. This trauma is reflected in the high incarceration rates, drug and alcohol addiction rates, suicide rates, homicide rates, teen-pregnancy rates, single-parent home rates, divorce rates, drop-out rates, mental health rates, and crime rates, that plague so many of our families and communities across America, and have done so since before anyone living today were born. What these rates reveal to us is that the trauma that we are experiencing and reacting to is not just a product of our own individual painful emotional experiences, or even a trauma confined to just this generation. These rates show us that this trauma is communal, spanning many generations and affecting our people as a whole. In order words, it is an inherited communal trauma that we, as members of the African American Community, were born into. The key then to really understanding and grasping the reality of our inherited communal trauma is to identify the source of it, and to do so, we must review the birth record of our ethnic community. This book, "8 Steps Towards Community Healing: An Afrikan-Centered Process", poses a path forward for our community, and therefore, ourselves, to overcome this inherited trauma and heal our community, using an Afrikan-centered approach that speaks to the root of who we are as a people. I have been on both sides of the trauma spectrum. I have been both in front of and behind the gun; ignorant, with no sense of community or direction, and caught up in a cycle of self-destruction. I have spent 18 years in state and federal prisons all over the country. I am a reflection of the trauma inherent in our community, and I have passed on that trauma to others. By the grace of the Ancestors, I have liberated myself from this trauma, and it is now my mission to help liberate our community from it as well, and to help bring healing to our people. My name is Halisi Olugbala Uhuru, and I pray that this book helps to bring healing into your life, and that this healing is spread throughout our community. Ashe! May the Ancestors be pleased with this work!
