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Between 2017-2019, myself and a colleague worked with a small group of women from across the African continent, now living in Johannesburg on an arts-based project entitled Mwangaza Mama.i Each Friday the group would meet to share breakfast, tell stories and work on quilt pieces that we were creating together. During these meetings the women would often talk about the everyday challenges of life in South Africa; of finding work, paying rent, covering school fees, accessing healthcare and staying safe in spaces of high criminality and violence.

“You need to understand trauma to be sensitive to it and then start looking at all your systems,” explains Mike Abrams, a facilitator from Hands On, who is running trauma-informed approach workshops with the Scalabrini Centre. These workshops have been exploring the impact of historical, collective and inter-generational trauma on collectives and organisations.

Through the workshops, Scalabrini is working to equip a group of people within the organisation – staff and peer facilitators – to understand what creates the intergenerational and historical trauma and look at how we can make the centre a more welcoming space – a space “which allows people to thrive and grow despite the pain and difficulty.”