ABSTRACT
In this chapter Rae Johnson speaks eloquently of the importance of acknowledging oppression and embodiment in psychotherapy. Research has established the crucial role of the body in navigating experiences of social difference and mediating the chronic trauma of oppression. It is now understood the body responds swiftly and strongly to relational threat, and that many social micro-aggressions are enacted nonverbally. This chapter offers a clear description of how oppression is experienced as a bodily felt sense and illuminates the mostly unconscious behaviours that perpetuate inequitable social relations. Embodied psychotherapy practitioners might bring themselves into an experience of fuller contact with social power, privilege and difference on reading this chapter. Additionally, they may become more aware of the complex territory these topics elicit in themselves and their clients, and feel more confident in navigating that territory, both in the therapy session and in conversations with colleagues.
