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Transforming Trauma Through Hip Hop Therapy

In-Person
1.5 CE Hour

Presented By

Dates and Times

  • -
    In-Person

Location

Description

Despite drastically different cultural underpinnings, Hip Hop and therapy are both widely used expressive practices that serve as a form of catharsis and connection. For over half a century, Hip Hop culture has served therapeutic purposes and reached people where, historically, talk therapy has not. With roots in progressive social movements and political protest, its messages transcend geography, race, ethnicity, and class. First developed in the mid-90s by Hall’s late mentor Dr. Edgar Tyson, Hip Hop therapy (HHT) embraces Hip Hop’s capacity to facilitate personal and communal transformation, mixing the inherently cathartic components of the culture with various well established treatment modalities. In this presentation, you’ll learn about:

  • • The basics of HHT and how it overlaps with several well-established treatment modalities, including CBT, DBT, narrative therapy, and expressive arts therapy
  • • The impact of a HHT Studio program at a second chance high school in the South Bronx over the past decade
  • • A trauma-informed approach to HHT, including top-down and bottom-up strategies
  • • How rhythm and rhyme facilitate self-regulation, co-regulation, bilateral stimulation, and traumatic processing
Learning Objectives

At the end of this course, participants will be able to:

  • Define the origins of Hip Hop culture and its inherently cathartic elements as they relate to various forms of psychotherapy.

  • Explain the theoretical and practical underpinnings of Hip Hop therapy as a receptive and expressive approach to treatment.

  • Explain 3-4 ways that a studio-based approach to Hip Hop therapy impacts a transfer high school setting over the course of a decade.

  • Analyze a trauma-informed approach to HHT based on the neurophysiological implications of its parallels with expressive arts therapy and EMDR.

  • Practice top-down and bottom-up techniques through song analysis and lyric writing.

References

  • Crooke, A., & McFerran, K. (2019). Improvising using beat making technologies in music therapy with young people. Music Therapy Perspectives, 37(1), 55-64. https://doi.org/10.1093/mtp/miy025

  • Cross, K., & Fujioka, T. (2019). Auditory rhyme processing in expert freestyle rap lyricists and novices: An ERP study. Neuropsychologia, 129, 223-235. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2019.03.022

  • Hadley, S., & Yancy, G. (Eds.). (2011). Therapeutic Uses of Rap and Hip-Hop (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203806012 Malchiodi, C. (2020). Trauma and expressive arts therapy: Brain, body, & imagination in the healing process. Guilford Publications.

  • Travis, R. (2016). The healing power of Hip Hop: Intersections of race, ethnicity, and culture. Praeger.

  • Travis, R., Rodwin, A., & Allcorn, A. (2019). Hip Hop, empowerment, and clinical practice for homeless adults with severe mental illness. Social Work with Groups, 42(2), 83-100. https://doi.org/10.1080/01609513.2018.1486776

  • Travis, R., Gann, E., Crooke, A., & Jenkins, S. (2020). Using Therapeutic Beat Making and lyrics for empowerment. Journal of Social Work, 21(3). 551-574. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1468017320911346

CE Policy
This course is fiscally sponsored by Exchange Events. There may be potential biases or conflicts of interest inherent to this relationship, and it must be disclosed to participants. These conflicts of interest have no bearing on the course content and have been resolved.
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JC Hall, LCSW, EXAT

J.C. Hall grew up on Long Island, New York. He is a Hip Hop artist by the name of Fienyx (pronounced “phoenix”), as well as a clinical social worker. Hall received his Bachelor of Science in Psychology at Fordham University in 2010. While pursuing his Master’s in Social Work at Fordham University’s Graduate School of Social Service, Dr. Edgar J. Tyson became Hall’s professor and mentor. Hall relied heavily on Tyson’s foundational HHT model during both years of his clinical practicum. Tyson’s supervision served as an integral touchstone for Hall while he incorporated his experience as a Hip Hop artist into his approach.

Through 2011 at an East Harlem neighborhood center and 2012 at a South Bronx nonprofit organization, Hall advocated for and created Hip Hop therapy groups within these agencies to service both high school and GED students. With much success at a

transfer high school in the South Bronx, Hall was given the opportunity in 2013 to build a professional recording studio in an old storage room to further develop his program. The early days of this process were captured by filmmaker Kyle Morrison in the short documentary Mott Haven, which showcases the use of Hip Hop therapy for communal healing in the wake of a school tragedy. The film has screened at several renowned film festivals across the United States, winning a handful of Best Short Documentary awards in the process.

Various outlets have covered the Hip Hop Therapy Studio at Mott Haven Community High School, and Hall attributes the program’s success to Dr. Tyson’s research and guidance. In addition to developing a close friendship over the course of several years, Hall and Tyson cultivated a strong working relationship, both presenting together at numerous events and collaborating on scholarly works.

Alongside Dr. Tyson and one of his program graduates, Hall presented his Hip Hop Expressive Arts Therapy (HEAT) model at the 2016 Coalition of Juvenile Justice’s National Disproportionate Minority Contact Conference (Tyson, Hall, & Montero, 2016). Earlier that year, Tyson asked Hall to contribute to his textbook on Hip Hop therapy as a featured author, and they were in the final stages of preparing for publication before Tyson’s passing. With the help of Tyson’s family, Hall is in the process of compiling his writings and years of unpublished research with the intention of completing the project as planned in his honor.

Due to the impact of his work over the years, Hall won the National Jefferson Award for Outstanding Public Service Benefiting the New York Community in 2020.

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