What is John Henryism and what it means for you
Happy equinox! I hope September has been more easeful for you than it has been for me. The only benefit of being on a plane as much as I have is the ability to read more. After a summer of consuming a lot of fiction, I’ve been craving non-fiction. That led me to Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric.
In the first few pages of this powerful book, I discovered the concept of John Henryism. In the 1970s, Dr. Sherman James developed the hypothesis while doing research on racial health disparities among Black people. You can read more about John Henryism from a number of sources, but in brief, it asserts that there are significant health costs associated with attempting to overcome racial discrimination and economic hardship.
In Citizen, this line particularly struck me.
“They achieve themselves to death trying to dodge the buildup of erasure.”
I mean, sit with this for a minute. Or more.
For those of us doing social justice work, it’s easy to justify overworking, for the cause, for those who have it harder than us or have less access. But it’s still causing damage. Just this week, Temple University president JoAnne A. Epps died on stage.
We are quite literally killing ourselves by taking individual responsibility for structural issues. That shows up in a number of ways. We chose jobs and careers that help us build a better world, thereby playing our part in dismantling structural racism or white supremacy. On the flip side, when women of color encounter discrimination or challenges to our leadership, we often blame ourselves without examining the structural and systemic factors that are at play.
Consider this an invitation to look closely at how you’re working. What can you do to live longer and healthier?
Sayu