Being a man of ideas and a counselor has always been part of Joseph Ghosn’s identity. An enrolled member of the Ernie Gros Ventre tribal nation, he began college at a Bible school in Oklahoma, but quickly became disillusioned and enlisted in the U.S. Army. Shortly thereafter, Ghosn, who was stationed in Germany as a tank crew patrolling the Czechoslovakian border, also realized that the military was not for him.
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However, during his military service, Ghosn met several officers who encouraged him to attend the United States Military Academy at West Point. Although he attended for two years, Ghosn once again realized that the military was not suitable for him at all, as he felt that the academy was focused on developing military officers to the exclusion of everything else. He sought further opportunities for much-needed intellectual endeavor.
So, two years later, Ghosn turned around again. This time it’s Harvard University. Having fulfilled the major college requirements at his points, West was able to immerse himself in the pursuit of ideas and graduate from Harvard University in his second year with a bachelor’s degree in psychology.
After graduating from Harvard, there were few paying jobs, so Ghosn worked as a volunteer on a tribal nation in Montana. There, he created health compliance procedures and administrative policies, worked on vocational education programs, and provided academic and career counseling to tribal college students.
““I never had a full-time job, but I never missed a day of work during that year,” Ghosn said.
He earned his doctorate in clinical community psychology from the University of Illinois and became a leading voice in the field, which he has used to serve Native American communities.
fast forward
Currently, Mr. Ghosn is Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School’s Blavatnik Institute, Professor of Anthropology at Harvard University, and Chair of the Harvard Native School, which serves Native American communities in all Harvard schools. He is the dean of the American Program (HUNAP).
His extensive research in community psychology examines the causes of depression, trauma, suicidal ideation, and addiction in Native American communities. He said some of his insights about these issues developed after receiving his Ph.D. and then solidified during his early research projects at his home. This project was designed to explore local community-based understandings of these mental health issues in an open-ended, discovery-oriented manner. A conversation with Traveling Thunder, a member of Gorn’s tribe at Fort Belknap in Montana, was an important source of discovery.
Their stories left an impression on Ghosn about why, for some Native Americans, it doesn’t help to receive mental health services through the Indian Health Service, a federal health program for American Indians and Alaska Natives. He said this was because it helped him understand what was being considered. Or even the options they pursue.
Traveling Thunder helped Ghosn understand that while some Indigenous people are accustomed to psychotherapy, many others desire a completely different kind of healing. .
positive identity
Ghosn said much of that healing should be designed to address anomie, or alienation, that stems from a lack of identity, purpose and belonging. This is often felt by many Native Americans who experience psychological distress as a result of colonialism. The challenge for community psychologists, he said, is to help tribal members recover a strong, positive Indian identity, develop kinship networks and find appropriate roles within the tribe.
Traveling Thunder explained to Ghosn that “these problems have their roots in European colonial conquest and subsequent subjugation and assimilation.” Ghosn said “Traveling Thunder” is not about psychological or biological disorders. “He was talking about history, culture and spirituality.”
According to Ghosn, the roots of these problems do not lie in modern definitions and diagnoses, nor do the solutions necessarily lie in mainstream psychological theories of mind or therapy.
As a result, his own research and work with American Indian tribes addresses the historical trauma that many say is at the root of these issues of mental distress, and the relationship between Native American culture and beliefs. The focus has been on developing synchronized interventions and healing methods. .
community solutions
Ghosn said interventions and resources, both modern medicalized psychology and community-based traditional healing, will bring in professionals trained in psychology and psychiatry, as well as the general public. He said people also need to be expanded and expanded by training them on how to identify and support problems. Robust treatment process. She said it is important to show lay counselors how to reduce the effects of historical trauma, recognize personal crises, and access the appropriate resources available to intervene. Approaches that tribes have found helpful include working with tribal members to develop a strong sense of self and a strong connection to their community through a return to traditional Native American practices.
“It’s certainly spiritual or religious,” Ghosn said. “But it’s also sociological or community-oriented.”
Ghosn said many of his colleagues in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine are doing similar work.
“We have people all over the world who are pioneering and innovating on how to develop state-of-the-art mental health treatments in very low-resource settings.” India is also low-resource. It’s a country. ”
However, practicing general medicine poses challenges in the United States due to medical licensure requirements.
“The question is, how can we train our members so that they are really helpful and never harmful,” Ghosn said.
crossroads
With offices in the Longwood Medical Region and Cambridge and a busy travel schedule, Mr. Ghosn travels frequently. He has made intellectual progress and is happy to be back at Harvard, praising its place in academia as “one of the most visited crossroads in the world.”
“I get notifications all the time from people from all over the Indigenous world and the Fourth World who come here for whatever reason and want to meet and talk. Whether it’s New Zealand or Australia. “Deaf,” he said.
Just three months after starting his role at HUNAP, Ghosn has strengthened his support for Harvard’s undergraduate and graduate students by “supporting, promoting, encouraging, and promoting cutting-edge research. ” said it has received support from University President Alan Garber to implement new initiatives aimed at expanding its efforts. Scholarship on Indigenous Peoples and Indigenous Issues. ”
He said Harvard is offering 10 classes with Indigenous content this fall and hopes to continue supporting Harvard’s Indigenous community through more classes and programs.
The hiring of four new Native American studies faculty members in 2018 was a major step in expanding Native American studies at Harvard, Ghosn said. HMS currently has two full professors: Gone, a native American, and Thomas Squist, his HMS Professor of Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, who is a member of his Taos Pueblo tribe.
But increasing the number of indigenous people in medicine remains a unique challenge, Ghosn said.
Professor Ghosn said, “It is difficult enough to attract a corresponding number of native-born students for undergraduate studies alone, and it is even more difficult for medical schools, etc.” They cited socio-economic challenges such as the lack of support structures that promote inclusion. Facilitate academic success in college and graduate school. However, he noted that his MD class of 2023 at HMS includes two Native American students.
But the commitment to increasing Native and Indigenous students, faculty and scholarships that Harvard has demonstrated over the past year makes him optimistic about the future.
“This is amazing and we won’t know the results for a few years, but it will be a breakthrough,” Ghosn said.
