\African-centered Psychology, Education and the Liberation of African Minds: Notes on the Psycho-Cultural Justification for Reparations

Authors

Karanja Keita Carroll, CUNY Bernard Baruch CollegeFollow
DeReef F. Jamison, Savannah State UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2011

Abstract

One means through which reparations can be provided to communities of African descent within America is through the creation and institutionalization of culturally enriching after-school programming, African-centered Saturday schools and independent Black educational institutions. Rather than looking to reparations as merely financial compensation for the descendants of the formerly enslaved, we can look to reparations as they relate to the building of educational infrastructures that will impact future generations of African descendants in America. This essay outlines the psychological and epistemological consequences of miseducation that many students of African descent experience within the Eurocentrically orientated education institutions they attend; The reclamation and revitalization of an African epistemology situates African people within their own cultural reality and allows them to stand firmly grounded in their cultural truth. We propose that reparations allocated through African-centered cultural enrichment programs that refute, counter and correct historical and cultural amnesia are critical as viable means for providing African descended people with the necessary tools needed in order to exist and flourish within the 21st century and beyond.

Comments

This work was originally published in Race, Gender & Class.