Collective Trauma in Jails and Prisons

By: Anonymous

Incarcerated people often find themselves in prison due to childhood trauma that has followed them and made their lives particularly challenging. For some, the trauma was rooted in the family; for others, the schools or other institutions. These challenges – social, emotional, medical, and economic – can have l ed to the transgressions that landed them in prison. Mental health issues are plentiful in prisons, with high numbers of incarcerated individuals prescribed psychiatric medications that sometimes help, sometimes harm, and sometimes have little impact. Too, there are people in prison with lesser traumas, similar to those of us who are not incarcerated, so we should not assume that all incarcerated people are rife with individual trauma.

That being said, no matter what the individual trauma that incarcerated people may bring with them to the prison facility, it is collective trauma that bonds them once they are there. 

While I have never been incarcerated, and cannot speak from experience, as an educator who teaches in a prison, I have been told of the challenging circumstances that incarcerated people face on a daily basis. To begin with, being locked into a cage with absolutely no autonomy is dehumanizing. Incarcerated individuals tell of the degradation they feel because although they are adults, they are treated like children, being told at what time to eat (and what to eat), what to wear, when to shower, and when to be where they need to be at any given moment. 

Independent thought is discouraged as is any effort to stand up for oneself. Incarcerated people are separated from their loved ones and for those who are parents, this is particularly painful, as this separation also renders family members of the incarcerated powerless and heartbroken, exacerbating the shared trauma of families and communities. One of the more egregious complaints heard by incarcerated people is the total lack of privacy, even while bathing, at which time guards can wander through the showers. Frequent strip searches add another layer to feelings of violation and lack of control over one's own body. Those who inhabit jails and particularly prisons feel delegitimized as people and this feeling grows over time, despite one’s ability to adapt. 

Human relationships deteriorate inside of the walls of a prison: people become fearful of whom to trust and whom to confide in. Worse, the guards’ treatment of incarcerated people can be hostile and cruel. Those inside of jails and prisons are referred to by their last name or ID number, with attempts at individuality crushed. The jangling of the guards’ keys, commands being shouted at them all day long, coupled with the bickering among other incarcerated people is nerve wracking and an assault to any modicum of personal space or privacy. Incarcerated people are made to feel, as one formerly incarcerated person told me, “like monsters.” 

This particularly unfortunate set of circumstances faced by all incarcerated people is the base for collective trauma. Whatever their situations may have been prior to coming to prison, whether they held a prestigious job or were unhoused, they are all exposed to the harshness of the prison world.

For those working with incarcerated individuals, it is important not only to understand the individual traumas faced by these people, but the way that their collective trauma affects their day-to-day lives, their sense of purpose or lack thereof, and their ability to persist. Finding ways to support healing becomes a vital challenge.

Through focused training in collective trauma and healing, professionals and volunteers who work with incarcerated people can become acquainted with how best to undergird their work with empathy and strategies for bringing humanity to a place where there is so little. 

Collective Trauma in Schools by Esta Montano, Ed. D.

Esta Montano is a veteran educator who has worked as an ESL/Bilingual teacher and school and district administrator. She was also the director of the Office of English Language Acquisition and Academic Achievement at the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. 

Those of us who are educators are long familiar with terms such as “trauma informed pedagogy” or “trauma sensitive classrooms.” We are aware that many of our students bring their own traumas in their figurative backpacks, and although we do not need to know the specific trauma that each child has experienced, it is critical to understand that trauma affects access to learning as well as a child’s overall wellbeing. We know that ignoring trauma is not in our students’ best interests nor in our own.

Having worked in urban schools for nearly 30 years, I believed that while not an expert,  I was, nonetheless, fairly well versed in how trauma affected my students and able to create trauma informed environments for youth and children. I was not aware, however, of the term collective trauma. It has been in learning about collective trauma that I have deepened my knowledge of how this phenomenon can and does affect teaching and learning and the overall school environment.

In simple terms, collective trauma, while related to individual trauma, refers to entire groups or populations of individuals who are simultaneously affected by similar events which cause trauma and therefore, harm, at the group level. By providing a few examples, I aim to give you an understanding of how collective trauma can be impacting your classroom or school building, without you even realizing it. 

Perhaps most easy to understand at the current moment is the manner in which ICE raids are affecting our students. If you work in a school district with large numbers of immigrant children, (or those who are the children of immigrants), you have seen the destruction that the fear of family separation has caused. At present, this does not just affect undocumented immigrants, but all immigrants who are in ICE’s crosshairs. If your classroom is composed of a number of immigrant children, you may have noticed their irregular attendance, inability to concentrate, dysregulation, weepiness, or high levels of distraction. Children who fear arriving home to find that their caregivers have been taken away lose their ability to focus, and when this shared experience affects more than a few children in your charge, then you are effectively dealing with collective trauma. This will make teaching more trying for you, as you struggle to deliver instruction to children who are living a nightmare.

Another way in which collective trauma can affect your students is neighborhood violence. If some or all of your students live in an area where weapons are prevalent, then they may have been exposed to the violence that guns can visit upon them and their families. Children who are not allowed to venture outside of their homes for fear of what might happen develop a collective mentality, or trauma, characterized by terror. While some children may try to normalize gun violence as a defense mechanism, others will come to school somewhat jumpy and ill-at-ease. Should you have a critical mass of children in your classroom who are affected by this situation, you may notice behaviors that can be directly attributed to it.

Racial trauma can also affect those who suffer from it at the collective level. Schools that have a significant number of Black and Brown students without their comprising the majority will no doubt be affected by daily microaggressions and other forms of bias and discrimination. Schools that prioritize the needs and feelings of white, middle class students are not designed for children of color, and this systemic mismatch takes an enormous toll on the children who are impacted by it. Educators often wonder, as Beverly Daniel Tatum noted in her book, Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?, racial trauma has directly affected this population and “sitting together” is one way to seek collective strength and healing. I use the title of this book to draw attention to this seemingly innocent but common bias that demonstrates how many white teachers fail to understand this collective coping mechanism in the face of racial trauma.

As you observe your students’ behaviors, try to reframe your understanding of trauma to include collective trauma. This shift in thinking can be instrumental in helping you to better respond to your students and the collective obstacles that may be affecting their capacity to engage and learn.Description text goes here