Ancestral Trauma

Trauma perpetrated against prior generations of a community, the legacy of which still exert powerful negative effects on its members. Linked to greater contemporary disease prevalence, health disparities, social marginalization, poverty and risk outcomes. The current generation bears the cumulative grief and loss of all those that came before. In many instances, aspects of ancestral trauma continue in present day through overt or covert forms of oppression and discrimination. Often used interchangeably with the term historical trauma.