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Psychology is one of the most rapidly growing fields in the social sciences. It seeks to understand human thought, behaviour and feeling. Yet, when we examine the individuals credited with laying the foundation of the discipline, we can see one thing in common: they are all white men. Freud, Jung, Adler, Piaget, Frankl — these are the titans of psychology, those whose work fills the pages of all psychology textbooks and whose names ring in university lectures and on bookshop shelves.
However, what is missing from this narrative is the contribution of Black psychologists, psychologists who were crucial to the development and understanding of psychology. This is not by accident; it is a consequence of systemic erasure.
Best-selling books, such as The Psychology Book: Big Ideas Explained and How Psychology Works: The Facts Visually Explained (both published by D.K. Publishing), offer comprehensive encyclopedic overviews of the field featuring hundreds of entries. But neither of these publications includes a single Black psychologist.
The same pattern carries over to any bookseller. Walk through the psychology section at Indigo any other major bookseller in Canada. After the first couple of shelves that contain books on cognitive science, behavioural psychology, mindfulness and positive psychology, you are hard-pressed to find any written by a Black psychologist. That sends a subtle but damaging message that Black minds and Black voices are not included in the canon of psychology.
Recovering what was lost
To adequately rewrite the story, we need first to recover it. This begins with the recognition of the supreme inequitable labour of countless Black psychologists who irreversibly changed the field of psychology — limited only, in some instances, by the field simply trying to forget them.
Francis Cecil Sumner, who is widely referred to as the “Father of Black Psychology,” was the first African American to earn a PhD in psychology (Clark University, 1920). Sumner wrote academic papers that acknowledged systemic bias and inequality against African Americans.
While Sumner was publishing in the 1920s, two psychologists, Mamie Phipps Clark and her husband, Kenneth B. Clark, were conducting the well-known “doll experiments” in the 1940s. These proved that the cultural and self-regard of Black children had been damaged due to segregation. The Clarks’ work eventually played a role in convincing some justices of the U.S.
Supreme Court in the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) that segregation in places such as schools should not continue to exist as it was unconstitutional.
The Clarks are best known for their pioneering research on identity and racial bias in children. In their most cited work, the “doll experiments,” their most important finding was that Black children preferred white dolls. Such findings were discounted by their more significant finding, that of evidence for internalized racism and the psychological effects of segregation. The Clarks argued that systemic racism contributed to Black children’s low self-esteem and deficiencies in their psychosocial development and perspective.
In their research on childhood racial identity development, they claimed to be the first to study Black children or children of colour. The significance of the Clarks’ work grew, following its citation in the civil rights Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education. This case can be regarded as one of the most significant instances of social science being applied in U.S. legal history.
Then there is Na’im Akbar, a current Black psychologist, who is recognized for synthesizing Afrocentric ways of knowing into psychology. A key part of Akbar’s contribution involved a significant critique of Western psychological models based on individualism and Eurocentrism. Akbar’s promotion of community, historical trauma and spirituality as foundational to the Black experience was only an example of his new thinking.
What about Beverly Daniel Tatum? Tatum is a former president of Spelman College and is best known for her scholarship around racial identities and education. Her book, Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?, is brilliant for understanding how systemic oppression operates by forming young minds.
Tatum is well known for her work on the topic of racial identity development, especially through the lens of schooling. Broadly based on William Cross’s Nigrescence Model, Tatum described her work as an exploration of how Black adolescents develop a sense of racial identity, particularly in predominantly white institutions.
In her influential book Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?, Tatum frames racial grouping not as self-segregation, but as a healthy and necessary part of the tailored identity space for youth in a racially divided society. Moreover, Tatum recognized just how much structured racism plays a role in the institutional development of the student. Therefore, combined with other educators, she made a call to create more equitable and inclusive educational spaces.
These scholars did not simply “contribute” to psychology; they interrogated and expanded the field’s domain. They revealed the blind spots of psychology and conceptualized how it can address race, power and identity in ways all too often forgotten.
Why this story matters
For Black students, creatives, educators and mental health advocates, this is not just a historical reckoning — this is validation. To see oneself represented in the histories of a discipline as deeply personal as psychology validates belonging, pride and intellectual curiosity.
Representation matters not just for social justice, but also scientific rigour. If social science erases the experiences and wisdom of entire populations in the study of the psyche, then the science is inherently compromised. A comprehensive understanding of psychology cannot omit what it means to be Black — it cannot simply remain as footnotes and electives in the body of theory and practice.
The cultural cost is significant: when authorities on mental health, trauma and resilience are almost entirely recognized as white voices, the various ways of healing, identity and community are narrowed. The work of Black psychologists, for example, provides different therapeutic modalities, critiques of colonial and western perspectives and praises of holistic mental wellness and justice that are rooted in their lived experiences.
Next steps in rewriting the canon
This piece is merely one movement in a much larger effort to diversify the field of psychology and make it more representative of the world as it is. Another source of information is the Association of Black Psychologists (ABPsi), founded in 1968, which is a leader in promoting equity and advocating for the field. Books such as Joseph L. White’s The Psychology of Blacks and Frantz Fanon’s Black Skin, White Masks include alternative frameworks that disrupt mainstream psychological theory.
Instructors can take steps now to incorporate Black scholars into their syllabi and reference their work. Students and readers can advocate with the publishers that support voices that are otherwise ignored. Bookstores can amplify these works by moving them to the front of their psychology sections.
As we continue to surface these erased stories of the past, we can contribute to making it possible for the next generation to see themselves not only as the subjects of psychology, but also as the indistinguishable, vital influences that shape what the field of psychology is today.
