Decolonizing Relationships: Navigating Cultural and Racial Borders.

Description:

Interracial relationships and societal acceptance of these relationships continue to increase in the US. However, the experiences of people in interracial relationships continue to be significantly impacted by discrimination, racism, and prejudice from society at large. These experiences are painful and challenging to the health of the relationship. Racism and prejudice might even be experienced by couples and exerted by others in various forms, including microaggressions, within the relationship itself as well as in the larger family systems within which the couple resides. This can be an additional challenge that experiences of racism and prejudice may at times even be experienced within the relationship itself between the partners. Talking about these experiences and processing them within the relationship is extremely difficult and painful but may be a necessary and crucial journey that couples can engage in as part of their healing and resilience as they weather the racism and prejudices of their larger social contexts. Contextual factors such as the historical context, the life span and developmental stages, and changing familial and generational roles and transitions, impact the multiple experiences of interracial couples and families as they navigate their relationships across the life span. The presentation will be based on the presenters’ personal narratives and descriptions of their own experiences as partners in interracial relationships. The personal narrative approach is being used as an effort to bring the actual lived experiences and meanings to the topic for this workshop and thus take a “decolonization” approach to presenting the scholarly work. Both presenters have conducted extensive scholarly work on interracial relationships and multicultural families but hope to approach this presentation from a personal lens in an effort to connect the research with lived meaning and realities. The presenters will focus on describing their own experiences of interracial relationships within the couple and familial context, the experience of intercultural differences and challenges such as racism and prejudice, navigating cultural and racial borders, and how partners and difficult conversations can be a source of healing, resilience, and resourcefulness – all within the context of multigenerational, life span developmental transitions and experiences. Case and personal examples and discussion of clinical implications for culturally informed and socially just approaches to working with IR couples will also be provided. This presentation will offer personal, scholarly, and clinical work guided by anti-oppressive, inclusive, and decolonization research and psychological principles when working with intercultural couples and their families.

Learning Objectives:

At the end of this presentation, participants will be able to –

1. Describe the challenges related to racism and prejudice that interracial couples experience.
2. Examine how these negative experiences can manifest within the relationship itself and across the lifespan of the individual partners and family.
3. Explore how therapy can provide a safe and challenging environment for couples to have difficult and healing conversations about their experiences of racism and prejudice.
4. Experience the value of difficult conversations and processing as a basis for healing and resilience in interracial relationships.