Film Notes
By
Halford Fairchild
February 5, 2008
Maulana Karenga: “Kawaida, Culture
and Psychology: The Issue of Human Wholeness” Invited
Presentation at the Annual Convention of The Association of Black
Psychologists,
Dr.
Wade Nobles presented a detailed introduction of the speaker, which noted that
he is Professor and Chair of the Black Studies Department at Cal State Long
Beach, the holder of two Ph.D.s, the author of two
books, the creator of Kwanzaa and the Nguzo Saba, and
an internationally renowned scholar/activist.
Karenga greeted the audience with his trademark “Habari
Gani” (“What’s the News”), “Hotep”
(Peace), and Asante Sana (Thank You).
“Our
beginning was great and good,” and we must achieve that greatness, and
goodness, in the reclamation project of African humanity. His focus, within the Kawaida project (a philosophical project that led to
Kwanzaa and the Nguzo Saba), to re-discover what it
means to be both African and human.
He
uses the Akan term, Sankofa, as a metaphor for
returning to the source and exploring the nature of human wholeness.
He
quoted Joseph White’s 1970 article on the nature of Black psychology who called
for the development of an ‘authentic’ Black psychology out of the experiences
of Black people.
He
noted that Diop (Cheikh
Anta Diop, the noted Egyptologist who proved the
Blackness of the ancient Egyptians), saw the importance of his work as
reconciling the contributions of African people to human history.
He
recalled several of the points made by Wade Nobles, that
the Black psychology project is the liberation of the African mind, the
empowering of the African character, and the illuminating and enlivening of the
African spirit.
He
noted that notions of “the self” ought to be multi-dimensional, involving
corporality (physicality), spirituality, personality and naturality.
Corporality
recognizes that the self exists in a body.
And the body’s suffering is a means to gain empathy for others and to
realize one’s own humanity. But he also
called for an “anthrocosmic” orientation – the
physical body exists in a space, that space being the world in which we live.
[The
idea of suffering reminds me of an article on “Self Suffering” that I authored
in 2000, that recalled a lesson learned from Mahatma Gandhi – we claim our
humanity through our suffering, which is why he fasted until he nearly died.]
The
psychological ideas of mind and spirit must recognize that these constructs
exist in a real person that has corporality.
Personality
and personhood are not the same.
Personhood relates to what it really means to be a human being.
The
Maafa (which Karenga also
calls the Holocaust) is a “rupture – a tearing in the fabric of human
existence. It is in sharp contrast to
Linda James Myers idea of an optimal self.
We
engage too much in over-indulgence on the self.
Instead, the self is embedded in a social network.
Our
challenges: (1) to counter the debasing
effects of American individualism; (2) to counter the dehumanizing effects of
the profit motive in market-driven concepts regarding ‘self-fulfillment,’ and
(3) recover human agency from the ‘holocaust’ of enslavement.
This
African Maafa, or holocaust, was an act of genocide
so morally monstrous it was a crime against humanity. Now, we must engage in a period of
re-affirmation. The Maafa
(Holocaust) was a destruction of human culture, it produced psychic damage in
the survivors and their descendants; it produced the destruction of human
possibility; it was a system of suppression that led to self-destruction and
the diminishment of human agency.
One
of the challenges is to find a way to talk about the Maafa,
to define it in a way that it can be properly addressed and redressed. Definition is important.
The
enslavement period was not a “slave trade,” which acquiesces to the
dehumanization of the captured humans.
It was a moral problem, not an issue of business or commerce.
“Power
is the ability to define reality and to have others accept
it even to their own disadvantage.”
Should
we stress the suffering of African people?
Or their resilience/resistance?
The
psychological paradigm encourages us to go to the mirror and reaffirm our love
for ourselves; but more important is to confront the monster that drove you to
the mirror in the first place.
It
is OK to love yourself. It is even more
important to be worthy of love by others.
How
do we engage socially, versus withdrawing into an individual self-indulgence?
Self-esteem
and Self-respect are very different constructs:
|
Self Esteem |
Self Respect |
|
Self indulgent Individualism Go shopping to feel good Burger King: Have it your way (?) No social requirement for Self-Esteem You can be destructive to others, and feel
good about yourself (e.g., gang initiations) |
A sense of worthiness based on conduct and
achievement within a value system that can justify itself through moral
reasoning. (e.g., Ma’at) |
|
|
|
Healing: involves the soul, spirit, body, and the
social conditions. Healers
(psychologists) must heal the objective life circumstances that people are in.
Our
challenge is to be more socially active.
MLK
noted that religions must be socially active, to address and correct the
external conditions of the people.
My
reactions:
· FYI: I was Chair of the Program Committee for the
Convention, and was instrumental in inviting Karenga
to speak.
· Karenga is a fairly controversial
figure. We (the IDBS) would probably
never approve his speaking in
· The introduction was
probably too long, because we were under extreme time pressure. The program went over by about an hour, which
messed up a lot the rest of the day. But
my sense was that it was worth it and we should have relaxed more about
it. (Na’im
Akbar also spoke at that luncheon.)
· I liked the echoes with our
course material: Kwanzaa, Nguzo Saba, Sankofa, and the fact
that he mentioned by name a number of people that we are becoming familiar
with: Nobles, Akbar, Joe White, Linda
Myers, and others.
· I liked his idea of an anthrocosmic
orientation.
· I very much resonated with
his emphasis on the collective, and his call for social activism and changing
the external circumstances that confront people of (more recent) African
descent.
· The Maafa
has gone on for 400-500 years. How long
will it take to reverse its effects? How
long will it take to recognize it for what it is, and to stop its continuation?
· The moral dilemma of
enslavement is a nice dovetail to the Rediker article
on atonement.