Oaxaca Conference

 

What Can We Learn by Giving Voice to People in the Southern Half of the World?

                                       By Paula Ochs

      "What can we learn by giving voice to people in the southern half of the world?" That was the question we were asked by Maurizio Andolfi, organizer of the first international conference on Working with Marginalized Populations: Professionals in the Trenches, which took place in Oaxaca Mexico(August 3^rd-August 6^th 2006 ). The answer was a surprise to me: I found out who I am, my place in the world. How I connect to others. How I might connect to others. 

     There were presentations from all over the world: Brazil, Australia, Columbia, Israel, the United States, Egypt, Argentina, among others. But these presentations, although very diverse, had many common themes: people become disconnected from their roots—they move or are forced to move because they are poor and have no work, or because they are persecuted or because someone takes their land. Or they lose their autonomy, their right to self determination, because they are dominated by another. In this way they are also disconnected from their culture, routines, meaning, language. Some people, children, live in constant fear—they become disconnected from their parents, their community because there is no safety. These are all examples of trauma. The trauma can be acute or chronic.

     With the trauma of disconnection comes a variety of problematic interpersonal relationships. Cut offs can result from trauma. Isolation can result from trauma. Violence can result from trauma. Desperation to stay too close to a child can be the reaction to being ripped from your mother or your father, your home. A benign habit can turn into a compulsion in an effort to have an anchor if you feel you are at sea. Feelings of hatred can go inward when you see that you are despised or that you are used by people who have all the power in your community, in your society. Chronic fear can leave you disconnected from your family, your own body. The work that it takes to survive can become so exhausting and overwhelming that there is less time to nurture relationships or oneself. You may turn to your children for help—send them to work at the age of 9, or depend on them for your emotional needs.

     While I listened to these presentations I reflected on my own family, not in the way I usually do when I think about my mother and my father and their strengths and weaknesses and what they passed down to me, but with a “meta” view. Why was my father’s mother so cruel? Why was my mother’s mother so nervous? Why were all the men dead so young? I started to think about my family in the context of community and the trauma they experienced as members of a community of immigrants during the turn of the century.

     One of the earliest presentations by Laura Calderon de la Barca, a woman born in Mexico, now working in Australia, put everything into a neat framework for me. It utilized some principals from chaos theory which I had the privilege of learning from an interracial team of therapists,

Jo Vanderkloot and Myrtle Parnell while I was at social work school. One of the tenets of chaos theory is based on fractals, which are entities in nature that look and act similarly to something bigger that they are a part of. For example, a fractal could be a branch which, when held upright looks like a miniature version of the tree from which it sprouted. Laura said that social systems act like fractals. A family can mimic a community. The interaction of individuals can represent the interaction of larger groups in the society. Laura talked about her personal shame as a Mestizo – a person of mixed Spanish and Indian blood-- and recognized that her shame was a fractal of her country’s, her society’s shame. Denial of this shame, said Laura, creates a problem of national identity in Mexico. Laura saw reflected in herself, the three stereotypes of Mexican: The Gueros: white privileged and seen as abusers, not human beings. The Indios: dark brown skin, lazy and fighting all the time; The Mestizos: mixed race, trying to pass a Gueros and trying to deny their Indio heritage Laura said that in order for healing to take place in herself and in her country, these three pieces had to move from their stereotypical roles into more three dimensional forms.

     I thought about my own heritage in terms of fractals and stereotypes. On my mother’s side, Sicilian: white, but considered inferior maybe having African blood, violent, stupid or shrewd. Oppressed in Italy, discriminated against the US but now considered powerful by people of color. On my father’s side: Jewish from what was once Austria-Hungary.  Oppressed in Europe, decimated by the Nazi’s and others. White, but considered inferior, “different” by many. Now seen as oppressors of Palestinians. How much have I internalized of the negative stereotypes? How much have I benefited from my skin color? I represent both the oppressed and the oppressor. When I meet with my clients, my colleagues, my students, I am viewed as all of these things. This idea connected me to the world in a new way.

     During Laura’s presentation a woman stood up to “ask a question.” “Why do you speak in Spanish,” she asked, “the language of the oppressor? You neglect the native languages which are dying. Indian children are ashamed to speak Spanish because of their accents. ‘Why are you ashamed,’ I ask them. ‘The Gringos speak worse than you are and they are not ashamed.’” I heard the insult—I am a “Gringo.” I also agreed with part of her statement—Spanish is the language of the people who destroyed much of Mexican culture along with the language. I also agreed with Laura’s response: Spanish allows us to understand one another.

     I decided to seek out this woman. I liked her spirit. I understood her lament. After the presentation I saw her standing on the balcony beside a man. I went up to her and pointed to myself. “Gringa,” I said, laughing. I held my arms wide open and she stepped toward me. We laughed and we hugged and it was a wonderful connection, devoid of anger. “Sorry,” she said to me softly. “No,” I said and stroked her hair. We parted. I didn’t want an apology. I just wanted to “say” with few words, that I was who she was accusing, maybe even hating. And I was not the stereotype of “Gringa” she had in her head. I was someone who could laugh with her and who could accept and understand her anger.

     The presentation by Francisco Jose de Roux was powerful, frightening and inspiring. Francisco described himself as an economist working in Columbia. He told us about the struggle of farmers there who are caught between the guerillas on one side and the para-militaries on the other. The families are torn apart in this conflict and they can become isolated from their communities and each other. He told this story: a woman lawyer came to this part of  Columbia from the city. She helped the farmers in many ways by using her legal skills in terms of getting them land and a fair price for their goods. One day the para-military came to her door and took her away. Days later her body was discovered: her arms had been cut off, her legs had been cut off and her head had been cut off. The 16 year old boy who told him this story said “This will not deter me from wanting peace.” The boy was the son of the lawyer who had been murdered. Francisco Jose De Roux said he refused to demonize the para-military despite their attacks and their torture. Why? It was very simple, he said. “If I demonize the people who hurt me and mine, it only entrenches my anger and I cannot move beyond it. I lose my ability to be creative and I become murderous.”

     I was so moved by this slight man with grey hair. This man who had the courage to sleep in a tent in the middle of an intense conflict. This man who risked his life working side by side with guerillas, the para-military and the farmers who want peace and to eke out a living. Sometimes when I’m in session with a couple who want to kill each other I get afraid. I get afraid even though there is no real risk. This man had so much courage. I felt compelled to touch him. It was as if he could give me some of his courage through his hands, his arms. I walked up to him. I said “I am a coward. I think that if I hug you I can get some of your courage into me, into my body.” He gave me a hug that went from head to feet. We stood there together for what seemed to be minutes and then we parted. He said: “Only those who acknowledge their role in the problem can be part of the solution.” I reflected that when I am in a session with an angry husband I have to see him as more than angry. I need to remember that he was once a boy; that he, too, has been hurt. Only by getting outside of the stereotypical view of him can I affect change. And so I am trying to hold onto the courage to stand up, to resist the desire to demonize what hurts me or others; to remain creative.

      Another presentation that moved me was given by Mustafa Qassoqsi. Mustafa has been working with children in occupied Palestinian territories. He talked about the fear and trauma that had devastated neighborhoods. Many children have symptoms of PTSD and believe that their parents and teachers do not have the ability to keep them safe. The incidence of PTSD is 50% among children in these areas versus 20% worldwide. Mustafa works with a camp for children that is run by an organization in Rome, Italy called “Confronti.” This organization provides a safe place for Israeli and Palestinian teenagers to live together in peace. The camp is located in Italy. Parents from Israeli and Palentinian families send their children to this camp because they know that peace through respect and understanding is the only way out of the conflict.  The camp has been very successful in creating hope for these families.  The video tape of these young people showed us their fears about meeting other young people who might want to hurt them. We saw the transformation in their faces from mistrust to trust.

     I felt my own heart swell with love and respect for this man, Mustafa, and the work he is doing. How does he manage to keep his heart open when he saw an eleven year old boy transform from a child into the remains of a human fireball after being hit by an Israeli missile? He does manage. “You must make a choice,” he says. “We have to manage pain in order to manage hope.” Again, I felt compelled to touch this man. I walked up to him and asked if I could kiss him. He said yes and in that brief, sweet moment I placed my lips on his cheek, I made a different kind of connection. One that sealed his message into my heart. It is easy to hate. But when we hate we give up the hope to make things better. If Mustafa can keep his heart open, I can also keep my heart open. Hatred and violence, even in defense, lead only to more hatred and violence.

  I thought about my mother’s mother: she came here alone on boat when she was 12 years old across an ocean. When she arrived she mistakenly went home with her uncle without going through immigration at Ellis Island.  A couple  of weeks later the police knocked on her uncle's door and took her away, back to Ellis Island,where she was put on trial to determine whether or not she would be deported back to Sicily.  (She was allowed to stay.)  She was separated from her mother, her father, her sisters and brothers who remained behind in Italy. Even after her family reunited, she never established a warm relationship with her mother. No wonder my grandmother had a nervous stomach. I understood how cut-offs could develop in a family like this. I understood how connections could be permanently severed. I understood my aunt’s recent suicide in a new context.    

     I thought about what might have happened to my father’s beautiful mother. The only story I heard about her immigration was that a young sailor befriended the gorgeous 18 year old. “How do you say ‘thank you’” she asked him. “Watch and chain” he told her. Maybe there were other small cruelties. What was it like for her to leave her town, her mother, her father, travel to Hamburg and then cross the Atlantic.  What cruelties did her husband, Louie, endure when he came to a place where he didn’t speak the language and was “A JEW” in the Catholic town of  Boston.  Maybe that explains his violent temper. The estrangement between my father and his 2 older brothers makes more sense to me now. The trauma of immigration can be very destructive.

 This perspective has helped me to understand my own shame and anger. I better understand the roots of pathology in my own family which makes me feel so connected to others who have shared the traumas of my own family. Listening to and observing the experience of others all over the world, and in the southern hemisphere in particular helped me to feel connected both through suffering and survival. I see how I fit into the world:  I see a common thread. This common thread, this connection, has made me feel strong, and better able to listen to pain. But we are not connected by thought alone. I found that touch can be very healing. Words are important, but we have other senses with which to connect. Our bodies, our flesh, sometimes need to connect as well. I thank the lady who took me for a “Gringa,” Francisco Jose de Roux and Mustafa Qassoqsi for sharing themselves with me through touch.

   Our work as therapists is, in part, to help people who have experienced traumatic events to reconnect with their families, their communities and ultimately themselves. This work can be dangerous if you work in some area of the world, and even here in the U.S. it can be difficult. This work requires us to understand how our “clients” see us and requires us to understand how we see ourselves. It also requires us to acknowledge that sometimes our clients know better how to heal themselves than we do. As therapists in the Northern Hemisphere sometimes we need to listen to what has gone wrong and then made right in the Southern Hemisphere.