Friendship issues between African American men in a therapeutic support group

Abstract

Very of ten the relat ionship issues presented by Afr ican American men masquerade as being no di f ferent f rom those of o ther men and, therefore, risk being mis interpreted as manifestat ions of convent ional interpersonal concerns. This v iew is simplistic since black men believe, and of ten deeply feel, tha t they are targeted by racism and thus t reated d i f ferent ly f rom other men (Hutchinson, 1994; Kunjufu, 1983; Terkel, 1992). The exten t of under ly ing shared experiences makes the bel ief in unfa i r t r ea tmen t a power fu l psychological context d i f fe ren t ia t ing the i r real i ty and consequent behavior f rom others. An understanding of such a perspective is necessary in o rder to sort ou t the issues under ly ing fr iendships among Afr ican American men and ways in which therapeut ic intervent ions might enhance them. In the i r fr iendships, Afr ican American men conf ron t scrutiny of thei r abi l i ty to handle the response of others to the i r race and gender. They must represent h o w they con f ron t the dai ly slights and indigni t ies reserved for black men as wel l as deal w i t h the larger issues of the i r social marginal izat ion and psychological