Introducing Afro-Asian Critical Psychology
The organisation that inspired us; we're building together
I think most of us can agree - there’s a lot that’s broken in society. How to fix it? Nobody in power really seems to know. There’s just a lot of ideas that have been recycled for decades, which seem to be making problems worse.
Still worse - sometimes it feels like those in power don’t care that things are breaking and broken, as long as they maintain their power and privilege. (In recent years there have been a few terms coined to describe this sense of decay, particularly but not just in the online realm - the ‘rot economy’ and ‘enshittification’).
Too many of these problems are complex, and can feel insurmountable. I think a lot of us feel powerless and alienated.
But these problems aren’t just complex. They’re existential, threatening our very existence. Giving up isn’t an option. We need to find another way.
A Different Drum is my way of trying to chip away at some of these problems - highlighting research that can be used to strengthen ourselves and communities; discussing perspectives of marginalised groups that deserve our consideration. If we look outside the old mainstream ideas that aren’t working; and consider a global community of voices - perhaps sow the seeds of change. Make the world just a little bit better. Step by step. From the ground up. From wherever we find ourselves in the world, taking ownership of that change and our place within various communities.
A Different Drum is more than just another blog - it’s involved in ongoing research, and aims to give people the tools to navigate research themselves (or at least our informational environment).
But A Different Drum is inspired and derived, in part, from another project. One whose mission we want to fund and expand, as well as build upon in our own way.
This project is Afro-Asian Critical Psychology. I sort of consider A Different Drum the niece of AACP. (If I could bear the word ‘nibling’ - I’m afraid I can’t - I’d make gender irrelevant here!).
Note: some of the following may seem arcane to lay people. Someone’s got to get into the weeds to figure out what’s important and how to create change. This is just one of many ways of doing that. Our job at A Different Drum is to try to make it all a bit more accessible. This post will likely be one of our least accessible, but we thought it important to showcase the work that we’re supporting. The short version is: Afro-Asian Critical Psychology focuses on a subset of psychology that examines the effects of power, and specifically focuses on psychology beyond wealthy countries. At A Different Drum, we think this kind of diverse thinking is vital to empower ourselves and create evidence based change from the ground up.
I’ve included headers in this post to aid you if you don’t want to read all the sections below.
What is Afro-Asian Critical Psychology?
Afro-Asian Critical Psychology (AACP) is a scholarly and activist organisation founded by Dr. Sonia Soans in 2021. Their initial aim (and predominant focus) is exploring critical psychologies in Africa and Asia (a subset of academic psychology - we’ll define it below), more recently expanding into neurodiversity and self-advocacy in Asia and elsewhere. This organisation exists as a forum for scholars, activists, and policy-makers at all career levels.
Sonia is an independent scholar based in India, who completed her PhD at Manchester Metropolitan University. Her work focuses on nationalism, and its intersection with gender, media, and mental illness. Peter Marshall, an autistic activist based in Manchester, UK, serves as her accessibility advisor. While independent, they are associated and seek association with several institutions. They are also affiliated with the Discourse Unit, a centre operating across institutions which supports qualitative and theoretical research projects developing radical theory and practice.
(Those working daily on A Different Drum are also based in and around Manchester, although we hail from Yorkshire, UK, and Sydney, Australia. As they say, “Manchester, we do things differently here”)
Many scholars in the Global South (simplistically - and this term is out of favour - the ‘developing world’) struggle to have their voices and perspectives heard. Scholars everywhere increasingly face precarious employment and declining support for the research and networking that will keep them employable. Critical work necessarily rocks the boat - and thus can come with risks for the scholar, no matter how important the work is.
These problems - and others besides, such as language barriers and Eurocentric trends in research publication - are exacerbated in the Global South. AACP exists as a forum to help counteract these barriers.
Some of AACP’s major work is described below.
In 2022, AACP held an international conference focusing on the voices of scholars from the Global South, and how the outsized influence of countries like the United States, United Kingdom, France and Germany distort or silence other contributions. Following on from this, they also presented at the Bandung Critical Psychology Conference organised by University of Padjadjaran, Indonesia.
The papers presented in their first conference are in the process of being published in the open access journal Annual Review of Critical Psychology. (It’s perhaps worth noting that there’s an expectation that these publications happen in English, the language barrier can be substantial, and editing can be time consuming and expensive. This is work that A Different Drum would like to take on and fund)
In 2023, AACP collaborated with the British Psychological Society (BPS) to organise an event for psychologists around the globe working on climate change. This was held across several BPS divisions. It provided a means to address climate change, as well as recognising the barriers facing advocates and scholars working in this area.
In addition to their work focusing predominantly on the needs of scholars in the global south, AACP have expanded their work into examining neurodiversity, both in the Global South but also in the UK. Working with Chris Bailey and Robert Chapman, they created a platform for autistic self-advocates in different fields, to discuss issues around the autistic experience. Further, in the wake of a recent murder reportedly carried out by an autistic person in South Korea, AACP sought to better understand the experiences of neurodivergent people there, and the impact of media misrepresentation on their lives. AACP thus convened a video discussion with the autism activist group 3Oceans. The video discussion will be made publicly available - edited by a member of A Different Drum - later this year.
We all - I think I can speak for AACP here - consider it vitally important to hear directly from scholars in the Global South (and, indeed, from marginalised groups from cultures both within and outside the Global North). They have concerns and perspectives that would not easily occur to scholars in other countries, if at all, and this may serve to dilute the systemic biases that plague a lot of academic research.
There’s certainly merit in detached, theoretical critique of a discipline, or writing about certain groups. But given both developments in critical work across disciplines, as well as the ease of communication, there’s no excuse for not including scholars from across the globe - and, indeed, giving subjects of academic research more of a voice in their portrayal.
What is critical psychology?
Psychology is the study of mind and behaviour in humans and non-humans. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline which spans the boundaries between the natural and social sciences.
Is psychology a science? Psychology certainly uses scientific methods and statistical analysis, and intersects with fields like neurology. But to call it ‘science’ can obscure the biases that can plague psychology (and other disciplines within the social sciences), and serve to uphold the status quo. Additionally, there are methods of psychological research which involve different methodology - these are no less valid, and can illuminate our understanding in different ways. (If you’re interested, I’m alluding to quantitative versus qualitative research: here’s a site that gives a quick overview of it)
Critical psychology, as noted, is a subset of academic psychology. As part of a wider critical tradition, it recognises, and draws attention to, the fact that knowledge is not created in a vacuum. Knowledge collection can be a by-product of power - not just class or wealth, but also the way in which societal structures serve some groups, and not others.
Consciously or unconsciously, our individual and cultural biases creep into how we research, collate data, and analyse results. To assume that some viewpoints are neutral is to elevate them, when that might not be warranted. And it obscures or erases the merit of other perspectives.
It’s not about tearing it all down. It’s about challenging our assumptions. What really works, and what doesn’t? Who does it work for? Can we do better, be fairer, and how? How do our systems translate when we apply them to different groups?
Critical traditions are often inherently and unapologetically political and activist in nature - and are becoming increasingly so. Might this muddy scholarship? Perhaps - but no more than assuming the status quo is exempt from critique.
Why critical psychology?
There’s two answers. One easy, and one interesting.
The easy answer is this – I have the privilege of knowing Sonia personally, I count her as a friend, and I’m inspired by what she’s doing. I think it’s important. I want it to grow and flourish.
The more interesting answer follows. It should be noted that I don’t come from an academic background in psychology. If it’s of passing interest, my background is in ancient history (sociolegal Greek history), along with secondary strings in criminology and English.
It’s long struck me that what we do, as individuals and groups, is sharply influenced by how we think. And how we think can be influenced and manipulated by forces around us – deliberate and inadvertent; nature and nurture; cultural and historical; and much more besides. I could easily give historical examples of that (I might: another day).
At this specific point in time, it’s becoming clearer than ever: Our thought processes are being manipulated and shunted into echo chambers. These echo chambers are fuelled by opaque algorithms. Also, any sense of legitimacy that our institutions have had is coming apart. Power is being concentrated in the hands of fewer people than ever, and the global order is coming undone.
Our concentration is being frayed, and our ability to think critically is coming under attack in popular discourse and, shamefully, in some education systems. (Indeed – the meaning of ‘critical thinking’ has been distorted, it seems to me, in some circles, to mean ‘contrarian’ rather than the rigours of source analysis, bias checking, and similar that are at the core of critical thinking)
Understanding our minds and the minds of others is more important than ever, as information is weaponised. And not just understanding our minds using the framework of psychology that has always existed. We also need to ask ourselves – does that actually work, or can we do better?
Critical psychology is not the only way to tackle these problems. Far from it. But it’s an incredibly valuable one. We take what we’ve learned about people and the ways in which they can be manipulated – as individuals and in groups – and we work out how to build upon that, and where we might need to repair it. Not just from one tradition, but from many.
What’s the connection to A Different Drum?
I founded A Different Drum as a direct response to Afro-Asian Critical Psychology: the work could be expanded if it were funded, and attracting funding would be easier if the work were better known. This kind of work might help us empower ourselves and help those around us. Both as marginalised people, and those interested in community building more generally. And while I’m keenly interested in empowering the Global South - by “us”, I mean the Global North. I write from the UK. We can all learn from one another, and maybe silenced voices have solutions to some of the messes we’re in.
As I say, A Different Drum is almost… Afro-Asian Critical Psychology’s niece.
We’re mutually supportive of one another. My vision for an expanded organisation is one where we can empower marginalised people in the Global North, in the short term, with evidence based perspectives and methods to strengthen yourselves and your communities. In the medium term, with skills sessions and classes on critical thinking and other skills helpful for academic settings as well as media literacy. In the long term (funding permitting!) we’d love to employ marginalised people to help both ADD and AACP with larger projects.
In the short term, A Different Drum is outreach, fundraising, and a springboard to guide and inspire our readers. And we’ve got a bit of research of our own in the works. We’ve got big plans. Watch this space.
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