The shadows within: internalized racism and reflective writing

Internalized racism is the belief by racialized individuals that derogatory messages about them are true. As such the individual becomes the agent of one’s own subjugation. Those who suffer from this type of self‐denigration and self‐hate must find a way to work through this psycho‐emotional experience. This project explores reflective writing as an open process to address the deep hurt of internalized racism. Reflective writing is an inherently expressed, multi‐voiced and reflective process that can empower individuals, giving them the tools, trust and power to facilitate their own healing on their own terms. Using the fields of narrative therapy and composition studies, four main benefits are discussed as they are synthesized and categorized from the relevant literature. In general, reflective writing addresses internalized racism by (1) externalizing the problem; (2) allowing the individual to re‐author one’s own story; (3) providing expressive space for working through emotions; and (4) facilitating the dialogical interaction between the multiplicitous and conflicted aspects of the self.