Masters Thesis

Mapping a whole new world with the Emma Center: integrative healing to generate empowerment

This project began as an investigation of best practices regarding treatment models in order to inform future development of The Emma Center (TEC). TEC is a nonprofit women's center for adult survivors of child abuse, domestic violence, and other traumas located in Humboldt County, CA. Their mission is three-fold: 1) to provide referrals, support, and advocacy to abuse and trauma survivors; 2) to raise awareness in the community about the effects of abuse and integrative, holistic approaches to healing; and 3) to open a women's residential healing center for women recovering from trauma-related conditions. It is with this latter point that my work with TEC has been concerned. A main component of this project is the Best Practices Report which is the result of research looking at several case-studies of organizations appearing similar in vision to that of TEC's women's residential healing center. Each case was broken down in a specially designed database by important factors such as treatment philosophy and approach models as well as organizational structure and start-up procedures. Against these models I compare TEC's goal and mission. Literature reviews present biomedical frame-works and the provision of services as well as the Empowerment movement and its origins. Since gender-related violence is primarily social, rather than medical in nature, placing this trauma and its subsequent strategies for healing in the context of western disease models is itself problematic. Thus, an approach to healing for women should be rooted in the notion of empowerment, enabling women survivors of gender-related violence to pursue individual and collective strategies for social change in ways that are appropriate to the political and cultural nature of the trauma. The project concludes after a report evaluating TEC. Perceptions of TEC's current needs, strategies, mission, and goals are looked at in depth. In light of strategic planning processes, I suggest possible adaptations and actions TEC might take in order to keep afloat and moving forward. The project ends with a reflexive statement to support the overall appeal that TEC make the most of the convergence of interests between the community and the individuals they seek to heal, expanding in the direction of social change work toward working toward their high goals.

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