Breaking the Chains of Psychological Slavery - Research Paper Example

Breaking the Chains of Psychological Slavery Table of Contents Overview 1 Chapter 1: The Psychological Legacy of Slavery 2 Chapter 2: Liberation from Mental Slavery 3 Chapter 3: Racial Religious Inquiry and Psychological Confusion 5 Bibliography 8 Overview “Breaking the Chains of Psychological Slavery” by Nai’m Akbar is a strong psychological document on African-American slaves. The psychological testimony bears fact and presents a volley of psychological study on the existence of the African-American slaves in contemporary time. The book also intends to throw light on the psychological findings and reasons behind the failure of the Black folks staying together. The book intends to find the psychological implication and aftermath for Blacks and Whites regarding the presentation of God as Caucasian figurine. Last but not the least, the book enlightens the readers to break the chain of psychological slavery by the thought provoking series of essay compiled and captivated within the pages of the book forwarded by world’s renowned experts on Afro-American minds. Chapter 1: The Psychological Legacy of Slavery Chapter 1 of the book comprises of theories and perceptions quite similar to the title of the chapter. In this chapter, author tries to focus on the attitudes of Blacks on various social, cultural and anthropological issues around man present in the environment. The chapter also intends to educate readers on the psychological implications of Blacks on various icons and commodities present in nature. The chapter precisely deals with the attitude of the Blacks towards Work, Property, The Clown, Personal Inferiority, Community Division, The Family and Colour Discrimination. Property: The essay clearly discusses the implication or to be more precise the consequence of the ritual of slavery for more than 300 years on the minds of the Blacks which is even responsible for shaping their attitude towards various psychological and social issues. The convention of slavery with its dark history of almost three centuries might be treated by the historians as a remote history in the contemporary perspective but for the sociologists and psychologists, it will remain to be the root of perpetual distrustful attitude among the slaves towards the society and also among themselves. As regards to the attitude towards property, the slaves have owned very small fortune always. This has given them a feeling of depravity and often led to jealousy towards their white masters resulting frequent vandalism towards them. This legacy continued, according to Dr. Akbar, amid their future generations too and leads to a sense of extra possessiveness and made them more protective about their rights and property. This feeling has evolved from a sense of deprivation and injustice which is quite logical and a point which will always gain support from any scientific and rational bent of mind. Colour Discrimination: For centuries the world got a neat division of two halves based on the colour of human beings. The world got divided into two regimes of White and Non-Whites and without any scientific logic or reason, Black was continued to be taken as an icon for darkness, evil and everything negative. On the contrary, White was treated as a source of positive energy and things within the nature. This discrimination based on the colours led to a tremendous inferiority complex within the Black slaves and Dr. Akbar argues rightly that the legacy of slavery came to an end only on pen and papers which indicates a legal end but distinction based on colour continued worldwide which consequently led to a communal distress quite abnormal in nature in the heads of the black people. There are lots of logic and enough points to support Dr. Akbar’s contention. As regards to the social standard and place in society, still the blocks are assigned in terms of Whites and Non-White entities which is an indication that discrimination on the basis of colour has almost become a social convention. This convention has not only given rise to a sense of inferiority complex among the Black people but also secluded them from the White society. This is also a reason why the Blacks are found in community and they feel comfortable to stay in clusters. The adverse effect of the colour discrimination is evident on the minds of the Blacks in contemporary time as well and the greatest example of this is their general tendencies to stay in a ghetto reaffirms the fact that discrimination based on colour have greatly affected the minds and psyche of the Black slaves. Chapter 2: Liberation from Mental Slavery The second section of the book bearing the title “Liberation from Mental Slavery” is a systematic culmination from the first segment of the book. All the reasons for mental chains existing due to an era of slavery inflicted upon the Blacks finds a true solution in this segment of the book. This portion of the book throws light on the various strategies that can be devised to break the mental chains. The compilation of essays mentioned in this segment of the book throws light on breaking down the chains of slavery through the means of self-consciousness and focuses on the sumptuous concept of “We Only Know What We Are” and tries to justify the argumentative point put forwarded by Dr. Akbar stating, “the very nature of mental slavery creates an illusion that we are free”. This section of the book throws light on the topics like Strategies to Break the Chains of Slavery, Knowledge of Self, Celebration of Self, Courage, The concept of “Umoja” or Unity, Faith and Getting to Work to make it happen. Strategies to Break the Chains of Slavery: In this section, Dr. Akbar devises strategy to break the shackles of mental slavery of a century old ritual of slave system and its psychological captivation. Dr Akbar recollects that except human species, all other animals on the earth are guided by a programming based on instinct. Only humans are the species that are guided by self-consciousness. Dr. Akbar takes reference of various scholars and points out that the nature of academics is based on the perspectives of social control operated within the society. Dr. Akbar explains that the composition of Black and White minds are alike and so the minds of human are pertaining to guidance or enslaved the excessive and deformed information about the White people and on the other plane absence of information on White people have subjected them to slavery. These points on the thesis presented in the second section of the book are completely agreeable. An age-old subjugation to slavery and distorted information has captivated the minds of Black people. It has bogged them down. It is only through self-consciousness and enlightenment that can become effective device in breaking the chains of slavery which has imprinted its mark on the mind and soul of these Black people. Knowledge of Self: Dr. Akbar discusses the strategy for coming out of the mental slavery through the method of self-consciousness. Human beings are guided by a strong sense of self-consciousness and argues that human beings are guided by the knowledge that are taught and the chains of mental slavery can be overcome by a strong sense of self-consciousness and feeling of self confidence. Dr. Akbar discusses that acknowledgement of slave mentality is difficult and this feeling is very much difficult to find acceptance because the basic nature of mental slavery creates the illusion that an individual subjected to it are free. Dr, Akbar here rightly focuses that the knowledge of the self or self-consciousness can only break the shackles of mental slavery. Chapter 3: Racial Religious Inquiry and Psychological Confusion The last section and also the concluding section of the book contains essays that focus on the imageries pertaining to religion and symbols that influence the mind of the people. This section of the book is most powerful and at the same time most controversial section of the book. The section includes topic like Religious Imagery, Impact on the Psychology of the Portrayed Race and effectively draws conclusion to the volleys of thesis presented in this book bearing the appropriate title of ‘The Solution’. Religious Imagery: Dr. Akbar is not only an expert psychoanalyst but also he is an expert sociologist. He develops the influence of the Caucasian image on the minds of the Afro-American people. Further Dr. Akbar focuses on the behavioural determinant pertaining to religion. In discussing this segment, he tries to explain that the behavioural determinant pertaining to the acceptance of the physical attributes of God as a White men and a sense of divinity associated with this icon or figurine. In discussing this factor Dr. Akbar tries to emphasize that “the notion that individual behaviour can be influenced by collective factors which are also historically remote”. This concept does not have a great acceptance and legitimacy in Western psychology yet there is lots of scope to accept the view point discussed by Dr. Akbar in this segment. If the omnipotent and all-powerful god has the appearance like the White people who have the masters of these Black Afro-American slaves for the centuries then an extra regards, fear and loyalty is ought to get associated with the figure of a White man. The Solution: In this segment, Dr. Akbar discusses the impact of various social icons and religious symbols prevailing in the society on the Afro-American community. Dr. Akbar discusses rightly and gives a wise solution to these long-drawn discussion and weighty issue. Dr. Akbar very legitimately puts forward that contemporary society should view the slave system from a different perspective and the objective of the society should not get confined to a mere measuring of their guiltless domination nor we should try to captivate the Europeans with an attempt of vengeance. The perfect duty of the society is to focus on the methods that can be devised to get liberation from the mental slavery by collecting and propagating the true history, reality and experiences of the Black people and transmit the knowledge as much intensely as possible. He rightly suggests of the perfect solution that opens a new vista completely. He presents the idea that substitution of an African image pertaining to race in place of a Caucasian one but true liberation can be defined as the ultimate recognition of the Creator is far above and far beyond the general periphery of human realm. The image as discussed by Dr. Akbar should be truly far above the reach of normal human beings and superior to all colours of skin. Bibliography Akbar, Na’im. “Breaking the Chains of Psychological Slavery”. August, 2006. Cultural Expressions. September 28, 2010. Pruitt, Bernadette. “The Punished Self: Surviving Slavery in the Colonial South”. Journal of Social History, 2003, pp. 545-547. Read More