Frantz Fanon and the Psychology of Oppression

PATH in Psychology

by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan

This is a biography of Frantz Fanon. It presents an absorbing and careful ac­ count of several impressive themes. First is the review and assessment of Fanon's life. Second is a theory of psychology, by the author, which will aug­ ment and prove useful to theorists and practitioners who focus on Third World people. And lastly there is a broad and systematic integration of many areas of scholarship including philosophy, anthropology, political science, history, so­ ciology, mythology, public health, and economics. Bulhan's writing is lucid, creative, and persuasive. It demonstrates that all these scholarly areas must be handled with erudition in order to build a baseline for understanding both Fanon and the psychology of oppression. Readers of Fanon will be familiar with the psychology of oppression which he presented so forcefully. How life events and experiences led to the formula­ tion of this psychology is the chief emphasis of the author. Yet the book also gives scintillating clinical proof that Fanon made many other significant con­ tributions to his field. He was an outstanding and dedicated physician as well as a philosopher and political activist.

Genres: Psychology, Race, Nonfiction, History, Politics, Biography, Africa

314 pages, Paperback

First published October 31, 1985

Reviews

[Zach Carter · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the greatest heartbreaks of the 20th century is that so many revolutionary scholars and guerrilla intellectuals died so young. Giants like Walter Rodney and Frantz Fanon wrote their seminal works (How Europe Underdeveloped Africa and The Wretched of the Earth, respectively) when they were in their 30s, arguably just beginning their pursuit of larger sociohistorical truths and revolutionary theories. What makes their works, and Fanon's in particular, so striking is their commitment to dialectics, and their clear connections to the likes of Marx and Hegel (while still unapologetically grounded in the Third World). Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan, a Somali scholar and founder of Frantz Fanon University, does an incredible job bringing Fanon's life and psychiatric theories to light, particularly as they relate to his more well-known theories on decolonization and violence. Reviewing the Hegelian master-slave dialectic, the concepts of recognition and Other, then moving into psychiatry and Fanon's introduction of sociogeny is all great, and Bulhan does a good job at dispelling some myths about Fanon's life and development. An absolutely underrated work that deserves to be seen by more people!

[Durakov · Rating 5 out of 5]

There were a few problems with this book: some older, outdated psychological language/analysis; an over-reliance on statistics in the section on contemporary (in the 80s) forms of death faced by black people in the U.S. and South Africa; and a few times when Bulhan makes apologies to the psychiatric system and diagnostic system he's critiquing. It still absolutely deserves the highest rating, because Bulhan is one of the few authors filling the huge gap in psychological/psychiatric literature when it comes to colonialism and race. I've struggled trying to find more than a short article on ethno-psychiatry, or the psychology of racism, or ways in which resistance movements can think about and adapt the methods of psychological thinking to their movements, and Bulhan took these issues on with systematically through the lens of Fanon.

This is not really a biography of Fanon in the traditional sense, but rather a book that incorporates his biography into a broader critique of psychological racism, the psychology of race/colonialism, and uses Fanon's clinical work as jump-off to talk about possible futures. It includes plenty of interesting facts and anecdotes on Fanon, but most of them relate at least partially to his psychological and political thought.

This is an essential book for anyone interested in how psychiatry was part of the foundation of scientific racism, for people interested in a psychology-centered analysis of Fanon, or for anyone interested in how psychology can be talked about in resistance movements.

[Rabbimo · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is HEAVY and TIGHT. It's not an easy read. Check out the section called "The Master-Slave Paradigm"

[A.J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I will never forget this book as long as I live because the author put words to concepts I’ve felt but didn’t have the language for before. One of those rare reads that feel like sunlight. Illuminating.

“In this way, race and racism come to be seen as metaphorical (McLaren and Torres 1999; Morrison 1992). In the creation of race as a metaphor, racial categories are given qualities felt to be natural and equivalent to the category, to assume aspects that are understood to be at the essence of a particular category. Through these processes of reification and essentialization, racial categorizations become literally "imbued with negative meanings or inscriptions" (Stephenson 1997, Paragraph 6). They are culturally-created stereotypes of action, thought, and meaning forced on the bodies of racialized others. This metaphor of racism has become an essential, if invisible and unexplicated, condition of Western and American culture (Morrison 1992).”

[comfort ify · Rating 5 out of 5]

This will be something I always return to and be better smarter because of it. He's too good. Opened my eyes, bruh. SO MUCH TO LEARN!! WE CAN BUILD JERUSALEM

Would it not be possible to gain insight while acting on real problems, treating not only through words but in deeds, emphasizing not how one is unlike but like others, and helping forge new bonds nurtured in a collective struggle

[Chidinma Osuagwu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easily the most well analyzed and comprehensive work on Fanon's WRETCHED. Recommend to those who read Wretched Of The Earth (Constance Farrington translation).

[n · Rating 5 out of 5]

People Hussein Bulhan and I both have a parasocial relationship with:
Frantz Fanon

[Muhiyodine]

i think it will good book