Mentoring,Scholarship,and the Professional Extended Family: The Legacy of Dr. Joseph White

Personal Reflections

In many ways, Dr. Joseph White was responsible for my decision as a college student to pursue a career in psychology. Despite my considerable interest in the subject matter, the psychology courses during my college years from 1968 to 1972 were narrowly focused on the dominant American culture to the exclusion of African Americans and communities of color. Given this emphasis, I struggled to envision how my experiences as an African American woman and my commitment to serving the priorities of the Black community could coexist in a field where such perspectives were denied a voice. My frustration grew until I read an article in Ebony magazine by Dr. Joseph White titled “Toward a Black Psychology,” in which he articulated the very issue with which I had been grappling:

It is vitally important that we develop, out of the authentic experience of black people in this country, an accurate workable theory of black psychology. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to understand the lifestyles of black people using traditional theories developed by white psychologists to explain white people. Moreover, when these traditional theories are applied to the lives of black folks many incorrect, weakness-dominated, and inferiority-oriented conclusions come about. (White, 1970, p. 45)

This article had a profound impact on the development of my African American identity, and it significantly influenced my own career direction. I was inspired by Dr. White’s example to contribute to the body of literature on Black psychology and to make a contribution to the Black community. His words led to my pursuit of a doctorate in clinical psychology at Teachers College, Columbia University, in the fall of 1972. Despite my earlier realization, I was still very disappointed when I realized that, similar to my undergraduate experience, my doctoral program had no Black faculty in my department, and the work of African American researchers and scholars was not included in the curriculum.

In the midst of this difficult educational period, I had the opportunity to deliver my first professional presentation on a panel at a major conference on Black people and testing at Hampton University in the spring of 1973. During the first day of the conference, I was sitting in the hotel’s lounge, struggling to improve my presentation, which had already undergone perhaps a hundred edits. At one point, I looked up. A Black man was standing over me with a nametag that read “Dr. Joseph White.” I was stunned and tongue-tied at the prospect of meeting this great man. Dr. White introduced himself and asked if I was attending the conference. I recovered my ability to speak, responded in the affirmative, and commented that it was an honor to meet him as he was one of my “heroes in the field.” He offered his characteristic grin, acknowledged the compliment, and asked what I was doing. I indicated that I was reviewing my presentation for the next day and confessed to my nervousness at the prospect of delivering my first presentation. Dr. White smiled, told me not to worry, pulled up a chair, and proceeded to spend the next 3 hours helping me edit and rehearse my presentation.

While we were working together, a number of prominent Black psychologists approached us. Dr. White introduced me by name to these giants in the field, including Drs. Reginald Jones, Tom and Asa Hilliard, Harriet and John McAdoo, and Harold Dent, and told each one that I was a young sister who was about to make her first presentation on a panel the next day. All were extremely supportive and offered words of encouragement. The next day, when the time arrived for me to give my presentation, Dr. Joseph White was sitting in the front row, looking like a proud father. Also in attendance were many of the Black psychologists that he had introduced me to on the prior day. I had expected to be overcome with anxiety; however, seeing all of those familiar faces of people I respected, and experiencing their support and encouragement, gave me the sense that I was presenting to my family. That experience, so early in my career, was transformative in how I viewed myself, and the confidence it engendered in my capacity to make a contribution to the field.

As attendance at professional conferences became a commonplace event in my life, Dr. White continued to help shape the course of my career and became a professional mentor to me. I, along with many other young African American psychologists, looked for Dr. White “holding court” in the hotel lobby during meetings of the Association of Black Psychologists, Division 45 of the American Psychological Association, and the Teachers College Multicultural Winter Roundtable, among others. It was his custom to spend time with those of us starting out, asking about our lives and careers and introducing us to every colleague who greeted him. This ritual was repeated during the course of my career as I progressed from student, to colleague, to friend. We often discussed our scholarly work over the phone, and our conversations always resulted in my enhanced clarity and confidence in my point of view. Generous with his advice, he often offered his frank opinions about my career progression and wrote countless letters of reference for me throughout the years. Never once did I take for granted the opportunities Dr. White offered me, as he did for all of those fortunate enough to have him as a mentor.

Mentoring and the Professional Extended Family

Dr. White expressed his availability and ever-present willingness to help younger professionals in terms of being a part of a “freedom train” of generations, in which the current psychologists of color would make a personal commitment to mentor the next generation as a way of giving back for the help that we had received. When young students have approached me at conferences, I am reminded of Dr. White’s description of mentoring as a “freedom train.” I think of his example of freely giving out his email address and phone numbers and being available whenever I needed professional advice, and I “follow in his footsteps” as I mentor generations of students and early career professionals.

As important as it was to him to help students and professionals early in their careers, he recognized that mentorship was a lifetime commitment. As I progressed in my career, there were many times when I encountered racism, discrimination, and microaggressions. As these incidents occurred, Dr. White was always there for me to help pull out the arrows and heal the wounds.

One of the very special moments in my career occurred in 1994 at the National Convention of Association of Black Psychologists in Philadelphia when Dr. White and I both received the “Distinguished Psychologists of the Year Award.” In our speeches that day, Dr. White and I had agreed that we would discuss how mentoring and developing a “professional extended family” could function as a survival mechanism for Black psychologists. To illustrate this point, Dr. White invited two of his other mentees—my husband, Dr. A. J. Franklin, and Dr. Thomas Parham—to join us on the stage. At Dr. White’s direction, we lined up in age order: himself, A. J. Franklin, myself, and Thomas Parham. He emphasized that each of us had started out being mentored, then developed friendships with one another, and eventually became closely connected as part of a professional extended family. Dr. White’s legacy of mentoring and the lessons of creating a professional extended family have sustained me throughout my career.

The value Dr. White placed on mentorship can also be demonstrated by the opportunities he gave students and young colleagues to participate as coauthors in the publication of his scholarly works. This value is also consistent with the intergenerational African tradition and another powerful part of Dr. White’s legacy. For example, the four editions of Dr. White’s book, The Psychology of Blacks (Parham, Ajamu, & White, 2011; Parham, White, & Ajamu, 1999; White, 1984; White & Parham, 1990) have not only made a seminal contribution to the field of Black psychology, as discussed below, the pattern of coauthorship exemplifies the intergenerational process of mentorship Dr. White illustrated in his speech to the Association of Black Psychologists described above. For example, in the second edition of the Psychology of Blacks (White & Parham, 1990), Dr. White invited Dr. Thomas Parham, a former student (currently the President of California State University, Dominguez Hills), to be his coauthor. In the third edition, the intergenerational torch had been passed. Dr. Parham rose to the role of first author, and, following the example set by Dr. White’s mentoring, invited his former student, Dr. Adisa Ajamu, to coauthor (Parham et al., 1999). By the fourth edition, Dr. Parham included his daughter Kenya along with another former student, Dr. Roslyn Caldwell, as contributors (Parham et al., 2011).

His model influenced my own process as a mentor. For example, I wrote a number of chapters on incorporating African American spirituality into the process of therapy with my former student, Dr. Tonya Walker Lockwood, an African American woman (Boyd-Franklin & Lockwood, 1999, 2009). Dr. Shalonda Kelly, an associate professor at Rutgers University, whom I have mentored throughout her career, coauthored chapters with me on African American couples (Kelly & Boyd-Franklin, 2009). In keeping with the process of mentoring the next generation, Dr. Kelly and I worked with a former African American student, Dr. Jennifer Durham, on a chapter on Black couples (Boyd-Franklin, Kelly, & Durham, 2008).

The Impact of Dr. Joseph White’s Publications on My Own Scholarly Work and Career Direction

Throughout my career, I have often observed the many ways in which my own scholarship and career directions have been influenced by Dr. White’s published scholarly work as well as his informal teaching and mentoring. As I indicated above, Dr. White’s seminal publication, Toward a Black Psychology (White, 1970), had a profound impact on my own scholarly work. During the 1950s and 1960s, many researchers, such as Moynihan (1965), viewed Black families through a deficit perspective. This view resulted in Black people being labeled as culturally deprived and disadvantaged. Dr. White challenged the “cultural deficit” theories, and instead posited that Black youth had developed “mental toughness and survival skills” (White, 1970, p. 45). He also took issue with the then-prevailing view of Black families as matriarchal:

A closer look at the black family might show that the matriarchal or one-parent view fails to take into consideration the extended nature of the black family. Looking at the number of uncles, aunties, big mamas, boyfriends, older brothers and sisters, deacons, preachers and others who operate in and out of the black home, a more valid observation might be that a variety of adults and older children participate in the rearing of any one black child. Furthermore in the process of childrearing, these several adults plus older brothers and sisters make up a kind of extended family who inter-change roles, jobs, and family functions in a way that the child does not learn an extremely rigid distinction of male and female roles. (White, 1970, p. 48)

While viewing African American family structures as having inherent strengths may have been self-evident to Black people as this was our life experience, it was considered a radical position in 1970 as it challenged the Eurocentric definition of the family based on White, middle-class, two-parent, nuclear families. Dr. White’s work inspired me to challenge this limited perspective.

My motivation to enter the field of psychology was to develop treatments for African American families, and the wisdom put forth by White (1970) transformed my view of this work. White’s later work on the Psychology of Blacks (White, 1984; White & Parham, 1990) expanded on the concepts he introduced in White (1970), seeking to replace the pejorative views of Black families with a more strength-based approach based on an understanding of the role of extended families and valuing collective support over the Eurocentric emphasis on individualism. Dr. White’s vision that social programs directed toward ameliorating the conditions and circumstances of African American individuals and communities be based on the Black experience and extended family support empowered and inspired me to develop my own dissertation research study entitled, “Clinicians’ Perceptions of Black Families in Therapy” (Boyd, 1977).

Black Families in Therapy

Building on the foundation provided by White (1970, 1984), and incorporating the work of Hill (1972, 1999) and Billingsley (1968, 1992), my first book, Black Families in Therapy (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003), challenged the negative views of African American families and emphasized the strengths that were evident in the cultural emphasis on strong extended family structures, informal adoption, sustaining religious or spiritual beliefs, survival skills, commitment to education, and a powerful work orientation. Consistent with Dr. White’s work (White, 1970, 1984), the importance of the extended family, including both blood and nonblood relatives, was a central theme in a number of my publications (Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005), and all of my books, beginning with Black Families in Therapy: A Multisystems Approach (Boyd-Franklin, 1989), and its second edition, Black Families in Therapy: Understanding the African American Experience (Boyd-Franklin, 2003).

One of the challenges I faced when writing the first edition of Black Families in Therapy was the prevalent view among many Black people that therapy was for sick, crazy, rich, or White people, but not for them (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003). Furthermore, many African Americans were highly suspicious of the role of therapists. White (1970) attributed this protective response to the experiences with systemic racism that Black people encounter in White America. This reaction, first elucidated by Grier and Cobbs (1968) and termed “healthy cultural paranoia,” was subsequently expanded on by White (1970). The concept greatly influenced my understanding of why many Black people were suspicious of therapists and did not believe in therapy.

During the process of writing Black Families in Therapy through ongoing discussions with Dr. White and other senior Black psychologists, it became clear to me that if clinicians wished to engage African American individuals and families in treatment, they were going to have to establish a therapeutic connection based on trust that could overcome healthy cultural suspicion (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005). Building on Dr. White’s work, I developed techniques for utilizing the strengths of Black families to establish therapeutic rapport and address healthy cultural suspicion. While many African American and other therapists of color understood how cultural suspicion could exist in cross-racial therapy, they were very surprised when they realized that Black clients were often suspicious of them as well. Thus, it was necessary for therapists of all ethnic and cultural backgrounds to be trained to overcome their clients’ healthy cultural suspicion. Boyd-Franklin (1989, 2003) also expanded on Dr. White’s work (White, 1970, 1984; White & Parham, 1990) by exploring issues of racism, Black racial identity and skin color issues and introduced these issues to psychologists and other clinicians, many of whom were unfamiliar with these aspects of African American life.

Many psychologists have stereotyped views of African American families similar to those critiqued by White (1970), and White’s (1984) later publication, the first edition of the Psychology of Blacks. In reality, however, there is no universal “Black family,” and, consistent with Dr. White’s work, my books (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003) acknowledged the diversity of family structures, circumstances, and socioeconomic levels including poor, middle-class, single-parent, two-parent, kinship and extended families, couples, and separated and divorced families.

In a striking departure from much of the literature of the time that pathologized religion and spirituality, White (1970) explored the role of the Black church in the lives of African Americans and recognized the strengths it provided for many Black people. He elaborated on the powerful role of the church family and the significance of the oral tradition in spirituals and “down-home sermons” (p. 50). Yet, despite this important insight, many psychologists continued to pathologize religion and spirituality in the lives of Black people.

White’s (1970) article, however, provided a foundation for my first book, Black Families in Therapy (Boyd-Franklin, 1989), in which I expanded on the role of religion and spirituality in therapy with Black families. The second edition of my book, Black Families in Therapy: Understanding the African American Experience (Boyd-Franklin, 2003), and my later article, “Incorporating Spirituality and Religion Into the Treatment of African American Clients” (Boyd-Franklin, 2010), while continuing to stress the role of Black Christian Church families, acknowledged the diversity of religious beliefs among African Americans with discussions of other groups such as Jehovah’s Witnesses, Muslims, (e.g., Nation of Islam and Sunni Muslims), as well as African religions.

Following in the tradition of Dr. White (1970, 1984), my discussions of the Black church family in the lives of many African Americans acquainted clinicians with an expanded view of the extended family (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003, 2010; Boyd-Franklin & Lockwood, 1999, 2009; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005), and emphasized the important role of older women and men in the Black church, who became part of these extended families. My scholarship was consistent with Dr. White and Dr. Connor’s work (Connor & White, 2006, 2011), discussed below, in which Black men in the church often become father figures to young African American boys and girls when their biological fathers not available. This departure from the Eurocentric view of the two-parent nuclear family is consistent with the African traditional concept that it takes a whole tribe to raise a child (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005; Parham et al., 1999; Parham et al., 2011; White & Parham, 1990).

Throughout his career, Dr. White’s scholarly works consistently addressed crucial issues that affected the Black community. In his mentoring over the years, he encouraged me and other African American psychologists to focus on the issues that were affecting our people and our communities. In the 1980s and 1990s, the AIDS epidemic devastated many in the Black community and had tragic multigenerational consequences for many African American families. Young African American adults who had contracted the HIV/AIDS virus through drug abuse and needle sharing or sexual activity often left orphaned children to be raised by extended family members. (This situation was also present and remains in many African countries today.) African American grandparents, particularly grandmothers, often found themselves mourning the loss of their adult children while also raising grandchildren, some of whom had been infected perinatally, making AIDS, in many cases, a multigenerational family disease. Building on White’s (1970, 1984) work and my earlier publications, I worked with a team of psychologists, social workers, medical doctors, and nurses to develop clinical strategies to address the catastrophic losses that many affected African American families faced. With Dr. White’s encouragement, we wrote our book, Children, Families, and HIV/AIDS (Boyd-Franklin, Steiner, & Boland, 1995), which described this work and applied the concepts of extended family support and strength discussed by White (1970, 1984) and White and Parham (1990) to one of the most challenging crises facing the Black community.

“Troubled” and At-Risk Adolescents

In 1989, Dr. White wrote the first edition of his book titled, The Troubled Adolescent (White, 1989). Sadly, the second edition of this important work, The “Troubled” Adolescent: Challenges and Resilience Within Family and Multicultural Contexts (Lovell & White, 2019), has been published posthumously. As a family therapist, I have done a great deal of clinical work with adolescents, children, and families, drawing on Dr. White’s publications in this area in my own scholarly work and career direction.

Sharing Dr. White’s commitment to influence the ways in which African American and other at-risk adolescents and their families were treated, with his encouragement, I started the Rutgers Somerset Counseling Program with Dr. Brenna Bry in 1993 and served as its director for 23 years. This program was a school- and community-based mental health program for at-risk adolescents attending middle school. The majority of our clients were African American and Latino. As a professor at Rutgers University, in developing this program, I drew on Dr. White’s position that programs for racial/ethnic minority youth required Black psychologists to venture out of the ivory towers of academia and reach out and become connected to the community. This community-based program influenced my scholarly work and led to the publication of my book, Reaching Out in Family Therapy: Home-Based, School, and Community Interventions (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2000), which explored how clinicians’ willingness to reach out to adolescents and families within the schools, the community, and the family’s home environment could effect dramatic change in their lives.

Dr. White’s last book, The “Troubled” Adolescent: Challenges and Resilience Within Family and Multicultural Contexts (2nd ed.; Lovell & White, 2019), and my latest book, Adolescents at Risk: Home-Based Family Therapy and School-Based Intervention (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019), both address and expand on our shared views of the challenges facing adolescents, particularly those from African American and other ethnic minority families. The parallel areas addressed in our respective books reflect many of the discussions that Dr. White and I had over the years. Another similarity between my scholarly work and Dr. White’s is our focus on practitioners’ ability to implement our findings in their treatment of clients. Both of us found the use of vivid case examples to be extremely helpful to our readers by clarifying and illustrating the issues and the interventions we discussed.

Lovell and White (2019) address the impact of racism, discrimination, and microaggressions on African American and other adolescents of color and their families. Similarly, in our book, Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019) discuss these issues as well, giving particular attention to the fears African American parents and families have for the safety of their children, especially their sons. Although the safety of Black sons has been a long-standing concern of mine—Dr. A. J. Franklin and I had addressed these issues earlier in our book for Black parents raising African American teenage sons (Boyd-Franklin, Franklin, & Toussaint, 2000)—it is a topic of significant salience presently given the disproportionate and increasing number of African American adolescent and adult males who are victims of racial profiling and police shootings. Consistent with Lovell and White’s (2019) discussion of racial socialization, both Boyd-Franklin et al. (2000) and Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019) give very clear examples of effective ways in which African American parents can talk to their sons to better protect them. Understanding the process of racial socialization is extremely important for psychologists, social workers, counselors, and other mental health providers when working with these adolescents and their families.

Another similarity between Dr. White’s work (Lovell & White, 2019; White, 1970, 1984; White & Parham, 1990) and my own (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2000, 2019; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005) is the emphasis on the importance of clinicians taking a strength-based approach and searching for examples of resilience in clients’ lives. Being able to identify and thus draw on positive attributes in these families may be complicated by the fact that, as pointed out in Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019), many clients, including at-risk adolescents and their families, present first with their problems. Training clinicians to have a competent understanding of cultural strengths can be vital to the process of identifying positive attributes in clients and families.

Dr. White’s original book on adolescents (White, 1989) as well as Lovell and White (2019) emphasize the importance of building relationships not only with the adolescent but with the family as well. Consistent with this point of view, the family therapy approach has been a cornerstone of all of my work, particularly with African American, Latino, other ethnic minority, and poor families (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2000; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005). In addition, Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2000, 2019) identify home-based family therapy as the one of the most effective modalities for reaching out to family members who may not be able or willing to come into clinics or schools. This novel approach allows the therapist to involve important individuals in the youth’s family and extended family in the treatment process. A technique espoused by Lovell and White (2019), as well as (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019), is the construction of a genogram, or family tree, which clearly identifies the members of the adolescent’s family. A case example accompanied by a full genogram is presented in Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019).

One aspect of extended family involvement in treatment is consideration of the kinship network. This network is addressed by Lovell and White (2019) and has always been a central part of my treatment approach (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2000; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005). Lovell and White (2019) elaborate on the long historical and cultural tradition of kinship care in African American, Latino, and other ethnic minority families. Many difficulties may arise when the caregivers are elderly, as often may be the case with grandmothers, grandfathers, aunts, and uncles, who are struggling with their own health, physical, emotional, and financial challenges. Our latest book contains an entire chapter on kinship care, exploring in depth the cultural legacy and strength of extended family members caring for children (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019). In addition, we address the increase in kinship care placements due to parental substance abuse; incarceration; mental illness; physical, emotional, sexual abuse and neglect; and incidents of domestic violence. A powerful case example involving an African American family highlights the challenges presented by parental substance abuse (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019).

Particularly relevant in the current political climate, Lovell and White (2019) address the issues faced by immigrant families from many ethnic minority backgrounds, such as the challenges of entry and navigating the immigration process, acculturation, and language differences and communication. Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2000, 2019) discuss these issues as well, and also explore the difficulties faced by many immigrant families who are forced to leave their children in their country of origin with extended family members until the parents are in a position to support the children and provide them with a home—a process that may take years. Reuniting with parents is particularly difficult for children who have been cared for in their country of origin by extended family members over an extensive period of time. They often enter the United States as young adolescents and they have to adjust to parents and possibly younger siblings who may be new to their lives, may have difficulty communicating in a language with which they are unfamiliar, attend a school totally unlike the one they attended in their country of origin, and, in the case of undocumented families, may fear deportation.

Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019) include a full-chapter case example that describes an immigrant adolescent and his family that utilizes the multisystems model, an approach introduced in Boyd-Franklin (1989), which encourages clinicians to view each client from a multisystems perspective when treating an adolescent who, along with his parents, faces many challenges. It presents multisystems interventions that include conducting individual therapy sessions with the adolescent, providing home-based family therapy sessions with the family, and reaching out to the school, which involves his teacher and achievement mentor, among others. Additional systems levels forming the intervention include the extended family, the school, the community, the youth’s peer group, family friends, the church family, police, courts, juvenile justice system, and the immigration authority, which is a central fear of the family (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019).

Like many ethnic minority and immigrant youth, the adolescent in this case example is drawn to a peer group, which is involved in a gang. This activity leads to his arrest for gang violence with consequent interactions with the police, the courts, and a probation officer. The therapist is able to join effectively with this youth and his family and to involve his school and his probation officer to help resolve the problems that the adolescent faces—tasks facilitated greatly by the therapist’s fluency in the family’s language. Through the therapist’s cultural competency and knowledge of the community, he is also able to help the family engage extended family members, and a church youth group that helps connect the adolescent to positive peers.

It is impossible to overstate the importance of the role of the peer group when writing about adolescents, particularly at-risk adolescents. Lovell and White (2019) explore the roles of peers from the perspective of both positive and negative peer influences, including gang involvement. Similar to Lovell and White (2019), Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019) explore the role of gang involvement in the lives of some at-risk youth. To some African American and other ethnic minority youth, who may feel disenfranchised and discriminated against in society, who may be failing in school, and who may feel disconnected from their families, gangs may appear very attractive because of their ability to offer a simulation of a family and protection from the dangers of the streets. In some cases, multiple generations of family members may be gang involved. In a case example in a chapter on multigenerational family issues, Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019) address the experience of an African American adolescent whose older brother is gang involved. In retaliation for the older brother’s actions, a rival gang breaks into the family’s apartment, threatens the family members, and assaults the adolescent.

Although substance use, including drug and alcohol abuse, can be major issues for adolescents of all backgrounds (Lovell & White, 2019), consequences are often far greater for many African American and other ethnic minority adolescents (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019). Without help and intervention, a disproportionate number of African American adolescents will be arrested for drug possession, while their White counterparts may receive drug treatment (Hart, 2013). Thus, substance abuse and other incidents, such as community and gang violence described above, are more likely to lead to the school to prison pipeline for many African American youth who become involved in the juvenile justice system at an early age (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019; Lovell & White, 2019). Connor and White (2006, 2011) discuss the role of Black men as fathers in the context of the mass incarceration of African American men, and reference Michelle Alexander’s (2010) classic book The New Jim Crow. This reality of incarceration and its impact on African American families is also discussed throughout my scholarly work (Boyd-Franklin, 2003; Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019).

Another approach, originally developed to treat substance abuse, is motivational interviewing (Rollnick & Miller, 1995), an evidence-based treatment. Motivational interviewing was described in Lovell and White (2019), and in a detailed chapter in my book Therapy in the Real World (Boyd-Franklin, Cleek, Wofsy, & Mundy, 2013). The issue of drug and alcohol use and abuse among African American and other ethnic minority adolescents has been addressed in much of my work. For example, Boyd-Franklin et al. (2000) included a chapter for African American parents suggesting ways in which they might help their adolescents and obtain treatment for drug and alcohol abuse, and Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2019) provided discussions about adolescent drug and alcohol abuse, including an exploration of how multigenerational substance abuse may occur in some families. A case example describes the way in which home-based family therapy is used to address this issue with an adolescent and his family.

Over the years, Dr. White and I had discussed many experiences in which members of the Black community had sought our help, advice, and expertise as Black psychologists when tragic events, such as homicides, violence in the community, gang violence, police shootings or suicide, took place. Adolescent suicide, another issue discussed by White (1989) and Lovell and White (2019), is affecting an increasing number of adolescents, including African American and other ethnic minority youth. Boyd-Franklin et al. (2013) discuss suicide risk assessment and suicide prevention for adolescents and adults extensively, with a chapter devoted to helping psychologists and other mental health providers recognize the warning signs of suicidality during a risk assessment, and ways to intervene to prevent suicide. In a chapter discussing crisis interventions postsuicide in a school and posthomicide in a clinic, my book Therapy in the Real World (Boyd-Franklin et al., 2013) presents a number of detailed case examples including one describing the aftereffects of an ethnic minority adolescent’s suicide resulting from bullying in school, and the subsequent interventions in the school with peers, teachers, and school staff.

Many African American and other ethnic minority youth experience a disproportionate incidence of trauma related to community violence, gang violence, racial profiling, and police shootings (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019; Boyd-Franklin et al., 2000). Physical, sexual, and emotional abuse are also sources of trauma for adolescents, as discussed in Lovell and White’s (2019) chapter on trauma and stress-related disorders, in which the many aspects of trauma and posttraumatic stress disorder were addressed, and trauma-informed care and trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy are described in detail (Lovell & White, 2019). That chapter also describes the impact on psychologists and other clinicians of hearing clients relate their repeated experiences of trauma. Feelings of empathy for clients who have experienced serious trauma may result in a therapist’s psychological response of vicarious trauma. This response can take the form of repeatedly thinking about the traumatic experiences of their clients, experiencing nightmares, secondary traumatic stress, or having compassion fatigue. If left unaddressed, these experiences may cause burnout in the clinician (Lovell & White, 2019).

In addition, as illustrated in Boyd-Franklin et al. (2013), therapists working with African American and other ethnic minority clients can also begin to experience vicarious trauma, secondary traumatic stress, and compassion fatigue in response to clients’ relating adverse events and life circumstances, such as poverty, homelessness, community or gang violence, police shootings, racism, oppression, and repeated microaggressions. These painful issues can also result in burnout for clinicians over time. The potential for such responses may be more likely with African American and other mental health professionals of color who have witnessed these experiences of trauma in their lives, as well as those of their own people and communities.

Boyd-Franklin et al. (2013) describe in detail the warning signs for therapists when reacting to clients’ experiences of trauma, including physical, psychological, emotional, cognitive, and spiritual responses. Positive responses to trauma, such as vicarious posttraumatic growth and vicarious resilience, can also occur as a clinician observes strength, resilience, and growth in their clients. A chapter in Therapy in the Real World (Boyd-Franklin et al., 2013) explores the vicarious trauma responses in clinicians and another chapter is devoted to the need for self-care for therapists. Therapist self-care can involve setting limits on the time devoted to work, relaxation, nurturing, meditation, exercise and physical activities, close relationships and friendships, fun activities, and regular vacations, holidays, and weekends off (Boyd-Franklin et al., 2013).

I have found that having and connecting with a professional extended family of African American and other psychologists of color, such as the one I shared with Dr. White, has been one of the most powerful forms of self-care throughout my career. Many of these friends and colleagues in my network, including Dr. White, had experienced the types of racism, discrimination, and vicarious trauma described above and could offer their wisdom and advice.

Black Man Emerging

Dr. White’s book, Black Man Emerging (White & Cones, 1999), explores the issues that have faced African American men in America since they were forcibly removed from their African homes during the Maafa and brought to this country as slaves (Akbar, 1984; Ani, 1994; Boyd-Franklin, 2003; Connor & White, 2011; Kambon, 1998). Subsequent chapters document the trajectory of the Black male experience from resistance to slavery, Jim Crow, and the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement. They trace the social construction of White male superiority and the stereotype of Black male inferiority from its inception during slavery to its continued impact on generations of African American men in America. In the remainder of the book, they present an opposing positive, strength-based, resilient view of African American men grounded in Black psychology. They offer multiple images of Black men in many different roles with varied life experiences whose biographies project alternative views of Black manhood, culminating in a discussion of the psychologically healthy African American male with a strong Black identity.

A number of chapters are devoted to African American masculine development during adolescence; the role of the family, peer groups, neighborhood, and street influences; and interventions. Throughout our careers, Dr. White and I often discussed the ways in which our scholarly work shared a similar focus. For example, we often discussed our work on the Black extended family. Another mutual concern was Dr. White’s discussion of the role of gangs in the lives of African American youth. His view was consistent with my experiences of the resurgence in gang violence in the cities and towns throughout this country (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2019; Boyd-Franklin et al., 2000). Dr. White stated, “Gangs feed on children from fatherless homes. Boys without fathers to guide them create their own rites of passage with gang initiations, getting girls pregnant, and macho violence” (White & Cones, 1999, p. 203).

In Black Man Emerging, White and Cones (1999) explore the potential of adolescent peer groups to be positive influences on youth through encouraging the adoption of prosocial values and practices, including those regarding masculinity and relationships with women; addressing issues of racism and discrimination; and the facilitation of Black identity development. Drawing on Dr. White’s work on young African American men, my husband, Dr. A. J. Franklin, and I wrote a book (Boyd-Franklin et al., 2000) for Black parents who were struggling with raising their adolescent sons in the face of staggering challenges, such as the number of young Black men who become victims of violence (both gang violence and police shootings), drug abuse, and incarceration.

Our book, Boys Into Men: Raising Our African American Teenage Sons (Boyd-Franklin et al., 2000), while documenting the painful statistics, is intended to provide hope and guidelines to African American parents to help them prepare their sons for the realities that endanger them, such as encounters with racism, discrimination, and racial profiling by the police. We focus on helping these parents develop a positive Black identity in their sons. Positive parenting strategies employed by African American mothers, fathers, grandparents, and other extended family members to surmount the challenges described above are discussed. The book also depicts Black fathers as functioning in a wide variety of roles, in contrast with existing stereotypes. Many of these roles are discussed in Connor and White’s (2011) book, Black Fathers: An Invisible Presence in America.

Consistent with many of Dr. White’s scholarly works (White, 1970, 1984), Boyd-Franklin et al. (2000) address the critical role of the Black church and spirituality in raising many African American adolescents. We discuss how pressures of demanding work schedules challenged parents to find the time to be available to their adolescents. Additional topics discussed include the following: (a) good listening skills that foster communication between parents and adolescents; (b) issues of teenage rebellion; (c) setting limits and discipline; (d) the role of tough love; (e) issues related to sex, sexuality, sexual identity, drugs, and alcohol abuse; and (f) fears of African American parents for the safety of their sons due to issues regarding gangs and Black on Black violence, as well as fears of the increasing number of young Black men killed in police shootings. The disproportionality in the treatment of Black males in educational settings is clarified, and strategies for parents to monitor and enhance the education of their children are presented, along with strategies for positive parenting. Parents are also encouraged to monitor all of the activities and entertainment that influence their adolescent’s lives, for example, social media, hip hop and rap music, and network television and cable shows.

The Psychology of Blacks

The first edition of The Psychology of Blacks: An Afro-American Perspective (White, 1984) continued to challenge deficit models of Black life, building on Dr. White’s earlier work (White, 1970). He focused on strengths such as the extended family, religion and spirituality, and survival skills. He also stressed the impact of the Association of Black Psychologists on the field of psychology. The second edition (White & Parham, 1990) explored the centrality of the African roots of the contemporary Black family in America and emphasized the strengths of this collective approach. This emphasis on the ways in which Black people have triumphed over adversity for generations is consistent with my own scholarship, and Dr. White and Dr. Parham both influenced and reinforced my work (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005).

All of the editions of the Psychology of Blacks contain comprehensive discussions of the struggle for identity among African Americans (Parham et al., 1999; Parham et al., 2011; White, 1984; White & Parham, 1990), reviewing the theory of Nigrescence and Black racial identity proposed by Cross (1980), Helms (1990), and Parham (1992). I discuss these concepts in depth in my scholarly work (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003) and expand the context to the ways in which these different phases of Black identity present in therapy with African American clients and families.

The fourth edition, The Psychology of Blacks: Centering Our Perspectives in the African Consciousness (Parham et al., 2011), continued the tradition of challenging Eurocentric researchers’ negative, inferiority, and deficit-based models that have been applied to the lives of African Americans—a theme present in all of Dr. White’s publications. The fourth edition further explores the development of an African-centered identity and argues for an African-centered psychological perspective. They encourage psychologists to pursue a strength-based perspective, an approach clearly represented in all of my scholarly work (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005). This perspective is also strongly advocated by the Association of Black Psychologists, whose role in defining and expanding the concept is described in vivid historical detail (Parham et al., 2011).

In the fourth edition, Parham et al. (2011) explain how the concept of “building for eternity” could be structured on the elements of cultural competence, including

(1) a strong belief in the possibility of human transformation, (2) a strong foundation and belief in theoretical and conceptual models of helping, and (3) knowledge of culture at the deep structure level (the difference between surface understanding and deeper insight). (p. 7)

In keeping with the theme of an African-centered perspective, the “spiritual core of African-centered psychology” (Parham et al., 2011, p. 35) is explored. They trace central African spiritual beliefs to their origins in ancient Kemet (Egypt), the Yoruba people of Nigeria, the Bantu-Congo tradition, and the Akan people of Ghana. Their chapter addresses the centrality of spirituality and spiritual energy to an African-centered psychology and how it functions to facilitate health, mental health, and the process of healing. Consistent with the fourth edition (Parham et al., 2011) and the third edition (Parham et al., 1999), the role of African religions, such as Kemet from ancient Egypt, Ifa originating with the Yoruba tribe of Nigeria, and Akan from Ghana, is a theme in my scholarly work (Boyd-Franklin, 2003, 2010), which is also presented in the context of the growing number of African Americans adopting and practicing African religions.

The fourth edition’s discussions of racism and oppression and disparities affecting the life experiences of African Americans (Parham et al., 2011) builds on White’s earlier publications (White, 1970, 1984; White & Parham, 1990). The historical perspective also gives considerable insight into the struggle many Black people currently experience in developing a positive African American identity. These themes are also reflected in my own scholarly work (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005), as well as in my article with Dr. A. J. Franklin and Dr. Shalonda Kelly, “Racism and Invisibility: Race-Related Stress, Emotional Abuse, and Psychological Trauma for People of Color” (Franklin, Boyd-Franklin, & Kelly, 2006).

Black Fathers: An Invisible Presence in America

Dr. White’s earlier work challenging the deficit theories regarding Black men and their role in African American families (White, 1970; White, 1984; White & Parham, 1990) had a profound impact on my scholarship regarding Black fathers (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005) and was very influential in how Dr. A. J. Franklin and I structured our message to Black fathers in Boys Into Men: Raising Our African American Teenage Sons (Boyd-Franklin et al., 2000).

Through vivid examples and scholarship, the second edition of Black Fathers: An Invisible Presence in America (Connor & White, 2011) challenges the ways in which Black men are often treated as though they are invisible in American society—a theme evident in their first edition (Connor & White, 2006) as well. This concept is also very prominent in my article with Dr. A. J. Franklin, Invisibility Syndrome: A Clinical Model of the Effects of Racism on African American Males (Franklin & Boyd-Franklin, 2000), which had been based on Dr. Franklin’s seminal work on the invisibility syndrome (Franklin, 1999) and his subsequent book (Franklin, 2004).

Contrary to the stereotype of their unwillingness to be present in their children’s lives, many Black fathers have a major role in child rearing and a great deal of power in African American families. Many therapists, however, treat these men as if they are invisible and do not include them in office-based therapy. Both of my books on reaching out to African American and other ethnic minority families (Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2000, 2019) have emphasized the value of home-based family therapy as a method to involve fathers of at-risk adolescents. Boyd-Franklin (1989, 2003), consistent with the work of Connor and White (2006, 2011), includes a discussion and clarification of the role of Black fathers.

Home-based family therapy allows a therapist to reach out to a father, or another male figure, for example, a boyfriend, stepfather, or grandfather, who may be present in the home but may not choose to participate in office-based treatment, a reluctance that may often be attributable to healthy cultural suspicion, as discussed above. It is important that psychologists and other therapists recognize that the role the father plays in an African American family is not dependent on whether he is married to the mother or is a boyfriend, as the boyfriend may serve as a stepfather for the children in the family. Numerous examples of the ways in which therapists might respectfully engage such males in home-based family therapy are presented in Boyd-Franklin and Bry (2000, 2019). In addition, consistent with Dr. White’s work (Connor & White, 2006, 2011; White, 1970, 1984; White & Cones, 1999; White & Parham, 1990), the importance of males who do not live in the family’s home is discussed. These men may play the role of father figures for children in African American families, such as grandfathers, uncles, play fathers, male members of the church family, such as ministers and deacons, and others within the extended family and the Black community (Boyd-Franklin, 1989, 2003; Boyd-Franklin & Bry, 2000, 2019; Boyd-Franklin et al., 2000; Boyd-Franklin et al., 2013; Hines & Boyd-Franklin, 1982, 1996, 2005).

Conclusion: Carrying on the Legacy

This review of my experiences of being mentored by Dr. White and becoming a part of his professional extended family have triggered a number of wonderful memories. In addition, it was very powerful to revisit so many of his outstanding publications and scholarly works. Despite my close reading of Dr. White’s scholarly works over the decades and my knowledge of the intersectionality between our scholarship and commitment to African Americans and other persons of color, preparation of this article affirmed the full circle I have come to in completing the journey between my own scholarly work and his.

Finally, I am also struck by the importance of continuing Dr. White’s legacy through challenging scholarship and the commitment to mentor future generations of African American and other young scholars of color who succeed us on “The Freedom Train.” It is incumbent on all of us to accept the torch from Dr. White, continue his example of multigenerational mentoring, add to the literature on Black psychology, and continue to grow our professional extended family.