Fanon Revisited: Exploring the Relationship Between African-Centered Psychology and Fanonian Psychology

This study is an archeological attempt to uncover the hidden discourse that exists in the space between African-centered theories of mental health and the concepts, issues and themes concerning mental health articulated by Frantz Fanon. The main argument being advanced is that within the psychological literature about people of African descent, the relationship between African-centered psychology and Fanonian psychology has gone unnoticed and often misunderstood when it is studied. I attempt to demonstrate when and where the various articulations of Africana mental health expressed by contemporary Black psychologists and Frantz Fanon enter into similar discourses. I am also interested in exploring and examining how these theoretical interpretations can be synthesized to produce an optimal and functional theory of Africana mental health. I contend that there is a very interesting and informative exchange of ideas to be found in the discourse between African-centered theories of Black mental health and the theories of Frantz Fanon. Adherents of both schools of thought have either marginalized or dealt with each other's ideas in a cursory manner. According to Gordon et. al., (1996) there are five stages and/or schools of thought that emerge from what is considered Fanonian studies. Four of the five main stages are: (1) various applications of and reactions to Fanon's work; (2) biographical writings of Fanon's work; (3) intensive research on Fanon's significance in political theory; and (4) the ascent of postmodern cultural and postcolonial studies of Fanon. Reflecting on the various approaches to studying Fanon, Bulhan (1985) argues: There is a marked paucity of systematic review in one crucial area: Fanon's psychological and psychiatric contributions. Such paucity is curious indeed. For Fanon was first and foremost a psychiatrist by training and profession ... His translated and better-known books either had psychology as their major point of departure or they incorporated psychological dimensions to complement, illustrate, and concretize the macro-social experiences he sought to unveil and transform (p. 6). According to Bulhan, the three reasons for the neglect of Fanon's psychological contribution are: (1) his contributions came out of the turbulent 50s and 60s when many of the former colonies were in the throes of national liberation; (2) his views on political violence, the colonized bourgeoisie, and the revolutionary character of the peasantry were perceived as more political than psychological and (3) his adherents were often political scientists, historians, or sociologists that approached his works according to the priorities, orientations, and concepts of their disciplines and often deliberately de-emphasized his psychological contributions (Bulhan, 1985). Unlike other analyses of Fanon (Gordan et al., 1996), Bulhan discusses the role and function of Black psychologists in the emerging discourse of Fanonian studies. He comments that Black psychologists "continue to show a great deal of interest in Fanon and the problems he studied ... his work strike(s) a resonant chord in Black psychologists" (Bulhan, 1985, p. 8). Yet, as poignant as Bulhan's points are about the mis-interpretations of Fanon within the various schools of thought, he implies that Black psychologist's interest, relationship and understanding of Fanon is somewhat naive. According to Bulhan (1985), Black psychologists "feel compelled to search for a more resonant and responsive 'black psychology', sometimes elaborating their own reactive theories to show how whites are genetically inferior to blacks" (p. 8). Thus, while Bulhan acknowledges Black psychologists search for an alternative paradigm as a progressive effort to deconstruct the hegemony of Eurocentric psychology, he also marginalizes Black psychology as a collective field of study that does not offer an in-depth understanding of the nuances and complexity of the relationship between Frantz Fanon and the psychology of oppression. …