Trauma is a deeply distressing or disturbing experience that has a lasting effect on personal functioning and well-being. It can be a one-time experience or it can occur multiple times, like when soldiers in a tour of war are exposure repeatedly and directly to the threat injury and death. A person can also experience trauma when he or she witnesses violence. Trauma experiences have been linked to psychological problems, like depression and anxiety, as well as physical problems, like impaired brain development, cardiovascular problems, and diabetes.

How does trauma compare to stress? Think of trauma as stress quadrupled in terms of its impact on a person.

One person’s experience with trauma can be entirely different from another person’s experience. Much of the differences depend on personal qualities, like age when the experience occurs and its intensity, as well as the conditions of a person’s life. Having few people to lean on for support, and living in an environment that is violent are two examples of how trauma can have a larger impact on one person than another ---- someone with several people she can rely on for support and residing in a home or community that is relatively safe outside of the traumatizing event or events.

Racial trauma is the cumulative impact of traumatic experiences based in racism (described below). Racism trauma is the byproduct of an accumulation of experiences of people targeted as inferior or subhuman that spans generations and therefore, it is made possible by societies in which racism continues to abound.

Racial trauma flourishes when there is racism. Studies have shown that racism is experienced at young ages for ALANA people and it continues over the course of their lives. It surrounds their lives in the same way that complex trauma does, there are biological impacts, interpersonal consequences, cognitive effects, socioeconomic consequences, and major, long-term health impacts.

Racial trauma is considered a major risk factor for victims in terms of physical health like diabetes, hypertension, endocrine and cardiovascular illness, and mental health concerns like depression, anxiety, PTSD, substance abuse, suicidal ideation and behaviors, in addition to premature death.

Children and adolescents who have experienced different forms of racial discrimination faced developmental concerns and major internalized and externalized problems that interfere with significant aspect of their lives later on.

More on Racism

Racism, which is at the root of racism trauma, is pervasive not only in the U.S., but also in other countries. Its global impact is experienced by people of various races in regions like Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. We hone on the experiences of African-descended people on this site.

• The practice of dominance includes Individual acts, like a single White person who feels entitled to report a Black person who appears threatening to the police. It also occurs at a broader level, such as with communities of Whites who establish and influence policies and laws that disregard the humanity of Indigenous people.

• Racism adversely affects African, Latino/a, Asian/Pacific Islander, and Native/Indigenous Americans (ALANAs). Not so incidentally, the malignancy of racism has spread: ALANA people can internalize racist ideas and thus, believe in the inferiority of their group(s) or other groups affected by it.

• The history of inhumane treatment of ALANAs is the basis of imperialism, colonialism, enslavement, and exploitation of the labor of the members in these groups, and the ongoing evidence of this treatment prevails in virtually all manner of social, economic, and political spheres of life.

Do I Have Racial Trauma?

How do you know if you have racial trauma? In many ways, people who exist in societies like the U.S. where there is racism are vulnerable to racial trauma. Often people may say, “I’ve never experienced racism,” when in fact, they are referring solely to individual acts of racism OR may have explained instances of racist treatment to other causes, like being young, old, heavy, a Texan, and so forth. These and other matters can indeed provoke poor treatment. In fact, one of the most tragic consequences of racism is the propensity to generalize aspects of life/living as related to one or a few things. Racism wipes away human complexity and thus reduces people’s humanity. But when people are steeped in an understanding of the possibility of racism as a contributor to certain actions and behaviors, especially at young ages, they can be equipped with “critical” abilities, that is, the capacity to view reality with an understanding of the hidden or silenced aspects of it.