RELATIONSHIP MATTER’S: Building Our Resilience
Mayo 12, 2018 Communities of color gathering
NIAAS leaders brought communities of color together on May 12, 2018 to continue our work of building relationships and solidarity between immigrants of color and African Americans. NIAAS aim to build transformational relationships, which for leaders of the network is directly connected to developing community leadership. Through dialogues leaders have identified the following key learnings about how to transform relationships:
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1) creating multi-cultural spaces that help African Americans and immigrants exchange personal stories as people of color. Story sharing is important for relationship building as well as the healing process, examples of NIAAS story-sharing include stories of: migration to the US and leaving people behind, and the historical legacy of slavery and struggle for civil and human rights for African Americans;2) Valuing and relating the histories of African Americans and immigrants of color, including the historical patterns and differences across various racial, ethnic, and cultural groups; and 3) Transformational relationships emerge out of a process of healing after suffering trauma. Immigrants of color and African Americans both face disconnection, feelings of not belonging, and treatment as second-class citizens, etc. because of the trauma stemming from structural racism. Processes that promote mutual healing lead to transformed and sustainable relationships.
Transformational relationship building supports leadership development in multiple ways. By addressing stereotypes and biases head-on through the telling of stories and experiences, the dialogues begin to erode barriers between people of color, allowing them to more effectively work and relate to other communities. It is important to underscore how racial trauma and experiencing racism manifests in anger, fear, sadness, rage, exhaustion and feelings of helplessness. Creating spaces for people of color to heal and build community allows for people to resist white supremacy together and rejuvenate themselves in continuing undoing racism. Healing is a necessary component in the ongoing leadership development of our communities. |
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