{"id":5700,"date":"2013-05-24T11:58:08","date_gmt":"2013-05-24T15:58:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/?p=5700"},"modified":"2013-12-20T17:41:57","modified_gmt":"2013-12-20T21:41:57","slug":"haitians-embrace-trauma-resilience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/2013\/05\/haitians-embrace-trauma-resilience\/","title":{"rendered":"Haitians Embrace Trauma-Resilience"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Harry Th\u00e9lusma, the sole male student in the center of this class on psychosocial trauma at the 2012 Summer Peacebuilding Institute, is committed to spreading trauma-resilience principles widely in his native Haiti. Professor Al Fuertes (front row, left), a native of the Philippines, has taught or co-taught this course five times at EMU. In this class, 12 countries were represented. Photo by James Souder<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
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With a history of violence<\/strong>\u00a0linked to colonization, intense poverty and vulnerable geographic location, Haiti has long suffered from natural disasters, social conflict, and other traumatic events.<\/p>\n

That is one reason more than 12,000 Haitians have welcomed trainings, materials and principles of Wozo, a program derived from EMU\u2019s Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWozo has helped me to know better ways to act and react when faced with conflict,\u201d says Smith Rafael<\/strong>, director of a school in his home community of Wanament. \u201cI live more nonviolently and help other people to do that too.\u201d Rafael says he uses Wozo material in a radio show he hosts for two hours each Sunday evening (streamed via powerhaiti.com<\/a>).<\/p>\n

For Dieudonn\u00e9<\/strong>, Wozo has been a vehicle for building self-esteem, both for himself, as a man with a deformed leg, and for Haitians generally, as citizens of a country dealing with a multitude of problems. \u201cWe need mental peace,\u201d he says. \u201cWe are so traumatized by our history, our culture and the earthquake, we must find ways to be at peace mentally. As a society, we have lost our self-esteem.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dieudonn\u00e9 (who goes by this one name) has undergone six operations on one of his legs to correct a deformation since birth. He walks with the aid of crutches and is coordinator of the Association of Handicapped Persons for Northwest Haiti. \u201cPrior to taking Wozo, I always had problems with accepting myself, the way I am. Now I accept myself as a person of value and know how far I can go. This has been the biggest change in myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wozo is basically STAR translated and contextualized for Haiti. STAR director Elaine Zook Barge<\/strong> and other project staff have taught trauma awareness and response skills to a core group of 1,000 volunteers, including Rafael and Dieudonn\u00e9, many of whom are now putting the concepts to work in their own communities. Sixty-eight of these volunteers have completed the Level II STAR program, enabling them to train others.<\/p>\n

Enthusiasm for the trainings \u2013 sponsored by six Christian organizations including\u00a0Mennonite Central Committee (MCC)<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 demonstrates the profound need for trauma work in Haiti, as well as STAR\u2019s relevance across cultures and contexts, say several people affiliated with the project.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is really a blessing. It is really amazing to have this kind of program in Haiti to contribute to the construction of human beings as well as the resilience of the Haitian people,\u201d says Garly Michel<\/strong>, the Wozo coordinator. He oversees the trainings throughout the country.<\/p>\n

The three-year project, now completing its final year, was launched in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake that killed 316,000 and left 1.5 million homeless, according to Haitian government statistics. Ten months after the earthquake, a cholera epidemic occurred. Originally focused on the areas most affected by the earthquake, Michel says the project\u2019s scope soon expanded to include all 10 d\u00e9partements, or states, in Haiti.<\/p>\n

Barge notes that Haiti also is recovering from collective, historical trauma from the effects of slavery during the colonial era, racial discrimination, and structural violence, including external interventions that impose foreign interests.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d like to see a nonviolent, healthy and resilient Haiti where each Haitian feels comfortable, safe and proud to live,\u201d says Harry Th\u00e9lusma<\/strong>, Wozo program officer.<\/p>\n

Michel, Th\u00e9lusma and 32<\/a>\u00a0other Haitians are alumni of\u00a0EMU\u2019s Summer Peacebuilding Institute<\/a>, where they have taken classes on a variety of topics, including humanitarian aid, leadership for healthy organizations, and monitoring, evaluation and learning.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With a history of violence\u00a0linked to colonization, intense poverty and vulnerable geographic location, Haiti has long suffered from natural disasters, social conflict, and other traumatic… Read more about Haitians Embrace Trauma-Resilience<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":73,"featured_media":5701,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1073],"tags":[1106,204,1107,1108,1105],"issues":[1100],"class_list":["post-5700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-magazine","tag-dieudonne","tag-elaine-zook-barge","tag-garly-michel","tag-harry-thelusma","tag-smith-rafael","issues-spring-summer-2013"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/73"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5700"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5700\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6182,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5700\/revisions\/6182"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5700"},{"taxonomy":"issues","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/peacebuilder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/issues?post=5700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}