Black Revolutionaries and the History of Community Acupuncture in the United States
What we now call “community acupuncture” originated with the Lincoln Acupuncture Detox Collective in New York City in the 1970s.
People lined up outside the Bronx’s Lincoln Detox clinic in the 1970s. Photo: Tyrone Dukes/The New York Times/Redux
The following blog post is a compilation of resources documenting the research and history of working class acupuncture in the United States. This compilation is by no means exhaustive, and CAP honors the histories, lineages, and revolutionaries both known and unknown in the continuous struggle to transform society, making healthcare and healing accessible for all.
Dope Is Death
By the early 1970s, heroin was flooding the streets of New York City. Black and Puerto Rican neighborhoods like Harlem and the South Bronx were hardest hit.
This four part podcast series explores how Dr. Mutulu Shakur, stepfather of the late Tupac Shakur, along with members of the Black Panther Party and the Young Lords, combined community health with radical politics to create the first acupuncture detoxification program in America.
Dope is Death: A Film by Mia Donovan
The story of how Dr. Mutulu Shakur, along with fellow Black Panthers and the Young Lords, combined community health with radical politics to create the first acupuncture detoxification program in America in 1973 - a visionary project eventually deemed too dangerous to exist.
In the Hands of Revolutionaries and Communities: A Social History of Acupuncture
March 22, 1972: Members of the Black Panther Party delegation with barefoot doctors near Nanniwan 南泥灣, a gorge ninety kilometers southeast of Yan’an in Shaanxi Province.
Eana Meng, researcher and author of the blog, Of Part and Parcel, first began unearthing and piecing together the hidden narratives of revolutionary acupuncture in the United States when she stumbled upon an article entitled, “How Racism Gave Rise to Acupuncture for Addiction Treatment”. The article described how the Black Panthers and other activists brought the ancient Chinese practice into addiction medicine in New York in the 1970s.
Eana has since released numerous articles, photo essays, and interviews of her own as a part of her ongoing research, including a two-part video series on the lesser known history of the use of acupuncture by Black revolutionaries and modern day practitioners in all different settings — from recovery clinics to prisons.
Part 1: Black Revolutionaries and Acupuncture? A History of Integrative Medicine
Part 2: “It’s First Aid!”: Tracing the Global Transmission of a Five-Point Ear Acupuncture Treatment
Honoring Dr. Mutulu Shakur and His Legacy in Using Medicine for Social Transformation
Mutulu Shakur (August 8, 1950 – July 7, 2023), Photo: Jim Hughes / NY Daily News via Getty Images, via Freedom Archives
Born Jeral Wayne Williams on August 8th, 1950 in Baltimore, Maryland, Dr. Shakur grew up mainly in Jamaica, Queens, New York City, and got involved in revolutionary organizing at a young age when caring for his blind mother and experiencing first-hand the inequities of racial injustice in the healthcare system. Dr. Shakur got involved in the New Afrikan Independence Movement (NAIM) at the age of16 and was active in the Revolutionary Action Movement (RAM). As a young organizer, Dr. Shakur got involved in helping political education initiatives in New York City, being able to contribute with the Black Panther Party even while not being a formal member of the party. He also was an active leader in the Black Liberation Army (BLA).
Shakur’s life took a new direction when he became a political education instructor at the Lincoln Detox Community Program in 1970. There, he gained a new-found interest in treating Black and Latinx people who faced addiction with acupuncture and other holistic health care methods. Learning from Chinese acupuncture methods, he then began training in Canada and California, eventually receiving his doctorate in 1976 and becoming licensed and certified to practice in California.
Dr. Shakur returned to New York and created the Lincoln Clinic’s acupuncture detox program. He served as Lincoln’s program assistant director until 1978. During this period, he also co-founded and co-directed the Black Acupuncture Advisory Association of North America (B.A.A.N.A) and the Harlem Institute of Acupuncture.
Prison Abolition, Political Prisoner Support, and the Roots of Community Acupuncture
After 37 years incarcerated and being denied parole nine times as a political prisoner, Dr. Shakur spent just seven months free after his compassionate release in December of 2022 before he transitioned. He would have celebrated his 73rd birthday, and first outside of prison in nearly four decades, on August 8th, 2023.
The following text is written by CAP’s Sonja Sivesind who participated alongside leagues of community acupuncturists, organizers, civil rights groups, and activists across the country for the just release of Dr. Mutulu Shakur.
Before acupuncture school, I was an organizer for social and political change. I worked toward ending the prison industrial complex, while educating and advocating for prisoners’ rights. I was privileged to work with powerful organizations like the Prison Moratorium Project, the Prison Activist Resource Center, and the California Coalition for Women Prisoners were visionary while making huge impacts on individual’s lives and institutional levels of change.
In 2000, I had the good fortune to visit Mutulu Shakur in prison. We spoke of activism, his history with the Lincoln Clinic’s acupuncture detox program, our comrades in common, like his codefendant, anti-racist activist, Marilyn Buck, who I visited in Federal Prison in Dublin, California. The successful WTO shut down was getting international attention, and I remember Mutulu being the most interested in hearing the details behind that organizing effort that I’d supported through the Direct Action Network.
Fast forward to 2022, when Mutulu had already been denied parole multiple times, former Political Prisoner, and community acupuncturist enthusiast, Linda Evans, reached out to ask for help getting acupuncturists involved in supporting another release campaign. We organized and educated and initiated campaigns to increase public support for Mutulu’s release. Many people supported this effort which finally resulted in Mutulu’s release in December 2022, allowing Mutulu to live the last 8 months of his life outside of prison.
Community Acupuncture owes its legacy to community leaders like Mutulu Shakur, and the full circle of acupuncturists fighting for his ultimate release is an example of the kind of collaboration and solidarity needed across movements today.
The Development and Popularization of the 5-Point Auricular Acupuncture Protocol
Dr. Richard Taft receiving acupuncture from a patient-trainee at Lincoln Detox Center (Photo from Taft Family History).
Dr. Shakur is known as a driving force behind the development of a 5-point auricular acupuncture protocol that is now widely practiced worldwide. The detox program he managed was recognized for its use of auricular stimulation for the effective treatment and support of thousands of patients.
The process involves the gentle insertion of up to five fine, single use, steralised, stainless steel disposable needles into specific energetic points in the outer ear. No electrical stimulation is used.
The five ear points:
(1) Sympathetic – calms the nervous system and helps with overall relaxation.
(2) Shen Men / “Spirit Gate” – reduces anxiety and nervousness.
(3) Kidney Point – for calming fears and healing internal organs.
(4) Liver Point – for detoxification, blood purification, and to quell aggression.
(5) Lung Point – promotes aeration and helps clients let go of grief.
The outer ear acts like a switchboard that sends impulses to the brain, which stimulate the release of endorphins, lowers stress and induces relaxation.
The NADA-system is most suited to group settings. An NADA Practioner will insert up to five needles in each ear for up to 45 minutes while clients sit in a relaxed atmosphere. During this time the client may fall asleep, experience a meditative state or just feel calm and relaxed.
Supporting Black Acupuncturists Today
BlackAcupuncturist.com is a national platform for Black acupuncturists in the United States and those who wish to find them.
Support the Black Acupuncturist Association, co-founded by Tenisha Dandridge, whose mission is to create a network of African Diasporan Acupuncture Medicine practitioners who work to promote, educate, elevate, and support African Diasporan Black practitioners while creating health equity in an inclusive and liberated world community.
Sources
https://freedomarchives.org/
https://www.ofpartandparcel.com/
https://dopeisdeath.com/
https://www.facebook.com/TaftFamHist
https://www.workingclassacupuncture.org/
https://pocacoop.com/
https://pocatech.org/home