CEED’s Reflections on the Value of Racially Affirmative Literature in Conversations with Children About Racial Trauma Race-Based Violence
The CEED community, like many of you, has endured this week with heavy hearts. We are exhausted after days of grieving and processing yet another act of racially motivated domestic terrorism in this country targeting Black communities. Our hearts go out to the entire city of Buffalo, New York and in particular to the children who have lost parents, grandparents, and beloved community members to the unthinkable violence that took place on Saturday, May 14.
Last weekend’s attack was a tragic and redundant reflection of our country’s flawed approach to gun legislation, but even more so, it was a frightening and undeniable display of the racism and white supremacism that are alive and well in our country today.
The motives behind Saturday’s atrocities, outlined in a lengthy statement allegedly shared by the perpetrator before the attack, bore a stark resemblance to the racist, fearmongering conspiracies that have of late been integrated into mainstream political and social rhetoric–A jarring example of how as long as power systems in this country continue to accept racism, white supremacy, and violent bigotry as legitimate political discourse, Black Americans will continue to face violence. Our communities and our children will continue to bear the trauma of existing in an oppressive society that views repeated acts of violent terror against Black people as idiosyncratic tragedies that must be endured in the name of “protecting” individual negative liberties. This has to change.
It is well documented in research that racism poses an acute threat to the mental and physical health of Black American families and children (Alvarez, Liang, & Neville, 2016). At CEED, we join others in our field in the effort to use our research to advocate for large-scale application of anti-racist practices in early childhood education to eradicate racism and its traumatic effects in their earliest stages. Our work focuses on the long-term vision of early childhood care systems that center anti-racism as a necessity for the wellbeing of Black children.
In the meantime, however, while we work to bring this vision to fruition, we recognize the need for strategies that help Black families live, thrive, access joy, and protect our children within the current environment. Research conducted here at CEED and elsewhere demonstrates that all forms of racism from microaggressions to discrimination to bearing witness to violence against community members (even through the news or hearing it discussed in conversation) can negatively impact a child’s development process (Comas-Diaz et al., 2019). It can cause a specific type of trauma known as racial stress and trauma, or RST (Comas-Diaz et al., 2019). RST presents in various ways, including both psychological and somatic symptoms. In children, it is often expressed as a hindrance to their development of a sense of self.
Of course, the psychological effects of witnessing repeated violence against Black communities are not limited to childhood. Adults have been shown to suffer the effects of race-based trauma as well (Bor et al., 2018). Protecting our mental health and our children from this trauma and continuing to see our communities shine despite the racial hatred and oppression we endure is perhaps the greatest form of resistance at our immediate disposal.
With that in mind, we would like to expand on the advice offered by our brilliant colleague Dr. Riana Elyse Anderson, assistant professor at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. Dr. Anderson was featured this week on Detroit’s Channel Four News to discuss mental health in the Black community in the face of racial violence and distress. In this conversation she suggested taking the following three steps to protect ourselves and our families:
Disengage from constant media: It’s important for us to take time away from the consumption of hatred and violence in the news and give ourselves permission to enjoy the peace and joy in our immediate lives.
Talk to youth about race: It is critical that we continue to normalize conversations with children about race and identity. For white youth, conversations about shared humanity must supplant any dehumanizing, racist rhetoric to which they may be exposed. For children of color, conversations around cultural and racial pride and celebration are a key tool for fortification against race-based hatred.
Vote in representatives unafraid to tackle gun control and race: We must disempower racism and the violence it begets. We need lawmakers who are willing to take bold action regarding gun restriction and who will fight to center anti-racism in classrooms, health care systems, and criminal justice systems.
We appreciate Dr. Anderson for her expertise and the work she is doing to provide us with tools to protect our mental health and our families. At CEED, our area of expertise is anti-racism in early childhood education. As such, we would like to contribute to the conversation by sharing some resources specifically related to suggestion two, talking about race with children.
We know how difficult it can be to discuss racial trauma with our children. Their young minds shouldn’t have to bear such a heavy burden. Our suggestion for reducing the stress and increasing the efficacy of these difficult and hurtful conversation is to approach them through the use of racially affirming storybooks during shared reading time (Curenton, S. M., Harris, K., Rochester, S. E., Sims, J., & Ibekwe-Okafor, N., 2022). Conversations framed around racially affirming story books function as a valuable tool to help our children understand and process questions of racism, race and identity in multiple ways: First, the use of stories that reflect, validate, and celebrate our children’s complex realities can help children build a robust sense of confidence and pride in their racial and cultural identities, which in turn can help them more easily bear the effects of race-based stress when it occurs. Second, storybooks allow children to talk about difficult topics from the lens of a character, reducing the intensity of these conversations by making them less personal and direct. And finally, when stories feature characters that share identity traits with our children, the trials, tribulations, joys, and successes of those characters may serve as a model for our children as they experience the same in their own lives.
Shared reading conversations sparked by racially affirming storybooks build upon the literacy practices Black families are already using and upon Black communities’ conversation-based traditions of ethnic-racial socialization. They offer a context for children to practice processing and articulating emotions, and they provide vocabulary for children to express their thoughts on topics like race, racism, and identity. All of these factors positively contribute to the development of children’s racial literacy, or in other words, their preparedness to handle race-based trauma in a healthy manner (Stevenson, 2014).
Helping Black children develop racial literacy is an invaluable way to protect them from the trauma of living in a racist society.
If you would like suggestions regarding racially affirming texts for Black children, our curated book lists can be found here (Sims et al., 2020).
We would also like to note an additional source of racially affirming literature: Netflix hosts a free series called Bookmarks which showcases Black authors reading storybooks that feature Black characters. Bookmarks can be found here.
We hope that the resources we’ve shared here, as well as the perspectives shared by our colleagues at SRCD and AERA, are helpful to parents as they navigate these difficult conversations with their children. As we continue to process the events of this past weekend we encourage you to make space for your feelings, whatever they may be, to allow yourself time for joyful moments with those you love. And as always, may we not forget to remind our children that they matter!
