The Intersection of Past and Present Trauma
Izze Johnson, Loveland Intern
As an organization with the mission to listen to, believe, and support all survivors, it is important that SAVA works to recognize not only the experiences of primary and secondary survivors, but also the personal realities for those dealing with historical trauma in all forms.
Historical trauma is the cumulative wounding that occurs as a result of trauma across generations. This phenomenon extends from events that target(ed) not just individuals, but collective communities (Azzahir et al., 2015). In this way, the trauma held by individual members of a group is transmitted across generations such that people who identify with that community today must carry the weight of both past and present hardship.
As with sexual assault, responses to historical trauma can be varied; there is never one “right” way to display a reaction to this emotional burden. Some of the more common demonstrations of historical trauma come in the form of survivor guilt, depression, PTSD, hyper vigilance, self-destructive behavior, suicidal ideation, and a preoccupation with trauma and/or death (Yellow Horse Brave Heart 2020).
With the many identities held across the United States, as well as the often-overlooked history of this country’s formation, historical trauma is a pervasive, if little-understood phenomenon. While the list of historical events that may have contributed to this trauma within the United States is too expansive to be fully expressed here, some events that can be considered are the American Indian genocide, the institution of slavery, the boarding school era, Japanese-American internment, and the Jim Crow era.
In the boarding school era, 90% of the Native American children who were sent to these schools were sexually abused (Azzahir et al. 2015); it was not illegal for a slave-owner to rape a slave, as this person was considered the owner’s property: in fact, the term rape would never have been used to describe the rampant cases of sexual assault experienced by both male and female slaves (Foster 2011); although concrete documentation has largely been destroyed, there are thousands of accounts of Japanese-Americans being sexually abused and assaulted while held in internment camps in the U.S. … and most of the reports that remain accessible today are classified as “female paranoia,” rather than assault (Wallace 2018).
Today’s descendants of these abused, mistreated, and marginalized communities are forced to face these grotesque realities of their ancestors’ experiences in a way that bystanders and even descendants of the aggressors are not. On top of this emotional burden, they must also relive this historical trauma on a regular basis due to the prevalent microaggressions that serve as triggers for this sort of trauma. Consider the news coverage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which touted headlines claiming that this was the largest massacre on U.S. soil except for Pearl Harbor: this portrayal entirely ignored the massacres of the American Indian genocide. Consider the anthrax scares that came shortly after 9/11: this harkens back to the smallpox outbreaks endured by Native Americans in the 1700s, particularly in its intention to poison a group while remaining physically distant from the action. Consider the stigma of testing positive for COVID-19 when your ancestors were shamed for potentially spreading tuberculosis among their
communities. Consider the heartache of having to forego social and cultural gatherings in the face of this pandemic, which can feel eerily similar to the prohibition of cultural practices for groups being forcibly assimilated to “American” culture.
There are no simple cures for historical trauma, but as a survivor-oriented organization, SAVA must take part in acknowledging and addressing the reality of these experiences, as well as being mindful of the ways in which we –as an organization and as individuals– can work to hold space for survivors of historical trauma and to combat the microaggressions that serve as triggers. Though less frequently discussed, this is all a part of being fully trauma-informed in our services and practices.
“What matters in life is not what happens to you, but what you remember and how you remember it,” -Gabriel García Marquéz
References
Azzahir, Atum, et al. “Historical Trauma and Cultural Healing.” UMN Extension, UMN, extension.umn.edu/mental-health/historical-trauma-and-cultural-healing#how-connection-to-culture-and-community-can-heal-the-wounds–378612.
Foster, Thomas A. “The Sexual Abuse of Black Male Slaves.” Human Trafficking: Yesterday and Today, History Engine: Tools for Collaborative Education and Research, 2011, historyengine. richmond.edu/episodes/view/6841.
Wallace, Nina. “Sexual Violence, Silence, and Japanese American Incarceration – Densho: Japanese American Incarceration and Japanese Internment.” Densho Blog, Densho, 2 Apr. 2018, densho.org/sexual-violence-silence-japanese-american-incarceration/.
Yellow Horse Brave Heart, Maria. “Trauma-Informed Advocacy in the Time of a Pandemic.” National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center, 24 June 2020, www.niwrc.org/resources/webinar-trauma-informed-advocacy-time-pandemic.