Reimagining Therapy Through the Lens of Liberation and Collective Humanity
Who gets to be human?
Who gets to be human in therapy?
These are not abstract questions. They are at the very heart of both global geopolitics and intimate clinical spaces. The world is grappling with intensifying violence, displacement, and social unrest. But none of this is new—or disconnected. When individuals seek mental health support today, they enter systems built on foundations that have long privileged a very narrow conception of what it means to be human.
Historically, therapy has been shaped by the gaze of white, European, cisgender, heterosexual, able-bodied, wealthy men. Their positionality—though often unspoken—became the unnamed “norm.” Everyone else was defined in opposition to this unacknowledged standard. And so, the humanity of those outside that mold became conditional, trickling down from the top of a social hierarchy that relied on marginalizing “the other” to maintain its own legitimacy.
Being Human as Praxis
This is where the work of writer and philosopher Sylvia Wynter becomes critical. She challenges us to rethink “the human” not as a static category but as something shaped by history, power, and culture. Her concept of “being human as praxis” urges us to see humanness not as a given, but as a practice—something we enact, redefine, and claim, especially when dominant systems try to deny it.
Wynter asks: What does it mean to be human? Her work pushes us to expose the dominant genre of the human—the supposedly universal subject—so we can begin to imagine many different ways of being human. This is a call to dismantle the invisible walls that uphold white, male dominance as default and to recognize the humanity of all people, in all their complexities.
Therapeutic Systems Rooted in Exclusion
In traditional therapeutic and educational systems, Western values of hyperindividualism and the rigid pathologizing of behavior are upheld as universal truths. Diagnostic codes reduce suffering to symptoms and isolate problems from the broader sociopolitical landscapes in which they emerge. Therapy becomes a tool for normalization rather than liberation.
But what if healing could mean more than just coping with injustice? What if it could mean transforming it?
Liberation-Based Healing: A New Paradigm
Liberation-Based Healing (LBH) confronts these structural exclusions. It offers a framework grounded in justice, relational accountability, and community. Rather than isolating personal struggles from social context, LBH insists that our wounds are collective—and so is our healing.
Consider this example:
A young woman feels chronically overwhelmed by work, caregiving, and family responsibilities. She struggles to find time to eat well, move her body, or rest. After months of internal debate—questioning whether she’s “sick enough” for therapy—she navigates a labyrinth of insurance bureaucracy to finally land an appointment. Once there, she is diagnosed with anxiety and offered breathing exercises and mindfulness techniques.
Traditional therapy would treat her distress as a personal malfunction. But LBH sees her as a product of cultural expectations that ask women—especially women of color—to perform endless unpaid labor, to be selfless martyrs, to manage without complaint. Her pain isn’t pathological—it’s political. Her anxiety is not a diagnosis in isolation; it’s a signal of systemic pressure.
Through an LBH lens, she’s offered not just coping strategies, but community—a space to name injustice, build relationships, cultivate solidarity, and reclaim time, space, and rest. In doing so, she doesn’t just survive—she participates in a collective reimagining of what’s possible.
Humanity as Relational, Not Hierarchical
Liberation-Based Healing insists on a relational model of humanity. It’s not about striving to reach the top of a constructed hierarchy but breaking it down altogether. Healing happens in the connections we build, the systems we challenge, and the ways we support each other’s full personhood.
Wynter’s question—“What does it mean to be human?”—echoes through this work. We respond, again and again, through our praxis: by standing together, reimagining therapy, and insisting that every human being is worthy of healing, dignity, and voice.
Join Us at the 20th Annual Liberation-Based Healing Conference
Dates: November 7–8, 2025
Location: Virtual via Zoom
Theme: Being Human as Praxis: A Therapeutic Reimagining
This year, we invite scholars, educators, clinicians, students, activists, and community members to gather and explore therapeutic strategies that promote justice, equity, and collective well-being. Come ready to engage, learn, and co-create liberatory practices that challenge the limits of traditional therapy and affirm our shared humanity.
Together, we reimagine healing. Together, we reclaim the human.