Workshop: Race, Risk, and Resilience among Black Youth in the United States and South Africa: Conceptual, Methodological, and Application Considerations

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This a proposal to support a symposium and workshop to be held at the 2012 International Congress of Psychology (ICP) Conference (July 22-27, 2012, in Cape town, South Africa). The goal of the project is to promote cross-national discussion and collaboration around conceptual and methodological issues in studying risk and resilience processes among Black youth. What makes this project so important and timely is that it incorporates, indeed hinges upon, a natural cross cultural comparison of South African and North American contexts. The symposium is focused on review and dissemination of expert knowledge of race-related psychological processes related to risk and resilience in South Africa where Blacks represent the majority population and the U.S., where Blacks are a minority population. The proposed structure of the symposium includes scholarly presentations by South Africa-based and U.S.-based scholars and panel response and audience discussion led by expert scholars from South Africa and the United States. The session will begin with an introduction of panelists and presenters and an overview of the issues to be addressed in the session. This includes the following: (1) why resilience is an important and meaningful construct to study among Black youth in South African and American contexts; (2) important conceptual, contextual, and cultural considerations in understanding resilience across these settings; and (3) what scholars and professional psychologists in U.S. and South African contexts can learn from one another about studying race, risk, and resilience and using knowledge to promote positive youth outcomes. The symposium includes a mix of junior and senior scholars who will each give brief presentations of research related to risk and resilience processes. A panel of scholars from South Africa and the U.S. will pose critical questions and comments to the presenters and encourage audience interactive discussion around considerations and challenges in conceptualizing, studying, and applying knowledge about risk and resilience to Black youth populations. Notably, this includes a discussion of the parallels and divergence across national contexts. The goal is that by the end of the session, scholars participating in the session will have a set of articulated theoretical and research questions related to the study of risk and resilience among Black South African and American youth. This symposium has considerable potential for scholarly development and contributions to multi-disciplinary literatures on psychological resilience processes among Black populations in multiple life domains (e.g., education, psychological well-being and life-satisfaction, health, political empowerment), potential extensions to other groups experiencing historical structural and social oppression, the rigorous demonstration and examination of multiple theoretical and methodological approaches, and the systematic examination of context effects and interactions among contexts on the life outcomes and adjustment of Black populations. The project's explicit attention to the application and use of scholarship on resilience represents broad impact in both theory and programmatic efforts around changing risky contexts to better support positive youth outcomes.