FRameworks/Positionality
Positionality:
I am a queer, Latine, cis- male, son of imigrants, and from a working class family. I center the needs of BIPOC people and firmly believe in abolition while recognizing I work within and trained within systems that uphold white supremacy that I also benefit from.
Narrative Medicine
I was lucky enough to have access to a course on Narrative Medicine taught by Dr. Kairos Llobrera, Ph.D. It was part of my second semester in my Master of Science in Global Medicine program (2016-2017). Since then I have continued to engage with the readings and sought out opportunities to explore this work further.
It was affirming to be taught by a BIPOC professor, especially in a course where narrative exploration was the backbone to the learning. In this course I learned about the movements of Narrative Medicine- Attention/Representation/ Affiliation and have since committed myself to exploring how they can be used in my work as a physician and activist. Dr. Rita Charon, the pioneer of Narrative Medicine challenges physicians to sit with the narratives that are shared, extracted and witnessed as a means of humanizing patients and the field of medicine.
Narrative Medicine gave me a framework to use story telling as a tool for healing. Story and narrative are not new to me; they are core to how I connect with my family- especially my elders. It is how lessons were communicated and passed down.
I see my work in Narrative Medicine as a an extension of my activism and my engagement with anti-oppression principles and practices. I am not an expert in Narrative Medicine but I am a believer and commit myself to uplifting those narratives that often go unheard, untold and dismissed.
Intersectionality
Coined by Kimberle Crenshaw, intersectionality asserts the reality of BIPOC folks, in particular Black women, can/do experience multiple forms of oppression at one time.
Cultural Humility
Coined by Dr. Melanie Tervalone and Dr. Jan Murray-Garcia, Cultural humility centers the need for ongoing learning and decenters the need to be labeled an expert. I believe it put a physician in a position of learner and listener, and places a patient in control of their narrative.
Radical Imagination
The radical imagination entails stepping outside the confines of the now and into the expansiveness of what could be. It has been described as the ability to dream of possible futures and bring these possibilities back to the present to drive social transformation
-Max Haiven-