The Im/possibility of Race: Raising Race in Psychotherapy

Abstract

This paper explores the tension between the ethical and therapeutic imperatives when the possibility of race as a motif in the client's presentation arises in the mind of the psychotherapist. This tension highlights the risk of oppression in speaking and not speaking in which the “floating” nature of race both in definition and in personal identity is revealed as compounding variables. Respect for the dignity of self‐determination in relation to the conception of the self emerges to resolve the tension between the ethical and the psychotherapeutic, paving the way for reflective questions for psychotherapists.