No one can see me cry: understanding mental health issues for Black and minority ethnic staff in higher education

Jason Arday

doi:10.1007/s10734-020-00636-w

Abstract

Black and minority ethnic (BME) communities continue to experience differential outcomes within the United Kingdom (UK) mental health system, despite increased attention on the area. The trauma of racism for BME academic and professional staff within higher education remains problematic against a backdrop of cultural and organisational institutional racism. Within higher education (HE), BME staff consistently face barriers in terms of accessing contextually appropriate mental health interventions that recognise the sophisticated nature of insidious racism in all its overt and covert manifestations. This paper attempts to address the issues facing ethnic minority staff within the Academy with regard to accessing mental health services at university. Importantly, this paper explores the impact of racial discrimination on BME faculty within the sector and the impact upon mental health, in addition to considering the paucity of psychological interventions available in dealing with discriminatory episodes and the need for universities to diversify healthcare professional cohorts. This study utilises the narratives of 40 BME academic and professional university staff to examine the impact of negotiating racial inequality and discrimination at university and the impact upon mental health. Other aspects examined consider the impact of belonging, isolation and marginalisation on mental health and how this consequently affects BME university staff. Conclusions and recommendations provided advocate greater diversification of mental health support systems for BME staff within universities. Conclusions drawn will also consider how existing systems can function to dismantle racial inequality and improve mental health invention for ethnic minority service users.

Highlights

The increasing pressure placed on academics within the higher education sector has led to growing concerns regarding the mental well-being of staff within universities
This paper examines the impact of negotiating racial inequality and discrimination at universities and the impact upon Black and minority ethnic (BME) staff mental health
Racism within the sector continues to persist at the expense of BME professional and academic staff who encounter this oppression through varying and sophisticated instruments of discrimination (Ahmed, 2012; Leonardo, 2016)

Summary

Introduction

The increasing pressure placed on academics within the higher education sector has led to growing concerns regarding the mental well-being of staff within universities. While there has been much needed widespread attention given towards the issue, there has perhaps been an omission regarding those whose experiences of mental illness are exacerbated by encounters of racism within the Academy. The continual and residual trauma faced by Black and minority ethnic (BME)1academics requires a particular set of psychological interventions that are situated in helping to unpack the violence of those racialised experiences. Research (Arday, 2018; Grey et al, 2013; Wallace et al, 2016) suggests that BME academics and professional staff continue to experience differential mental health support and psychological interventions in helping to successfully navigate mental illness, in relation to the trauma experienced when facing and navigating racism (Burnett and Peel, 2001; Cooper et al, 2013; Vernon, 2011). There remains a lack of understanding concerning the nuances of discrimination and racism that invariably affect mental well-being, that of ethnic minorities who often are subjected to discriminatory and stereotypical judgements posited by healthcare professionals upon presentation of psychological symptoms or altered mental state

Objectives

Methods

Findings

Conclusion