In order to reach sanity, the underlying assumption of the Afrocentricity paradigm is that Africans must reclaim their sense of agency. As a non-structural response to black disorientation and loss of agency, the paradigm is suggested as a revolutionary movement in thought (Asante, 2009). As a starting point, Afrocentric researchers pose the question, "What would African people do if there were no white people?" The questions are intended to illustrate what natural reactions would have occurred in African people's relationships, views toward the environment, kinship patterns, religion, and historical reference points if colonisation and slavery had not occurred.
Asante (2009, p.12) contends that Afrocentricity provides a response to this dilemma “by affirming the centrality of the African subject in the context of African history”. “This effectively displaces Europe from the centre of the African reality.
As a result, Afrocentricity is a revolutionary concept since it examines concepts, events, personalities, and political processes from the perspective of black people as subjects rather than objects”. From the aforementioned findings on the African's role in his metaphysics, four unique features emerged. The distinguishing aspects of Afrocentrism are situating the phenomenon, the investigator's stance, cultural critique, and analytic Afrocentrism.
51 3.5.1 Locating the phenomena
Afrocentricity holds that no phenomena can be completely comprehended without first locating it. It is said that a phenomena should be analysed in connection to psychological time and space, and that it must always be situated.
As a result, this is seen as the sole method for investigating the complicated interrelationships between science and art, design and execution, creation and maintenance, generation and tradition, and other areas neglected by theory. In this sense, the African interpretation of dreams should not be completely divorced from the Western approach.
Caperton (2012) believes that the concept of compensatory dreaming in Africa has a striking resemblance to Freud's and Jung's conceptions of dreaming. In the Freudian paradigm, for instance, a reference to another person in a dream amounts to nothing more than a reflection on the dreamer's inner existence.
Dreams reveal the character of the dreamer's inner existence, as evidenced by instances from the present study's findings in chapter five. Consequently, despite the vast disparities between the Eurocentric and Afrocentric interpretations of dreams, there are several parallels.
3.5.2 Position of the investigator
The Afrocentric approach views things as varied, dynamic, and in constant motion. As a result, a person must correctly notice and record the position of occurrences despite variations. The phenomena's location is a crucial theoretical process that influences how the researcher perceives the experience. From a Eurocentric standpoint, the treatment of mental conditions in no way involves the use of dreams. Rather, it is accomplished via the application of psychological techniques, such as CBT. From a Western psychology standpoint, Geiger et al.
(2013) present a variety of methods and techniques for coping with treatments and dreams. The authors argue that CBT is utilised frequently when treating nightmares, but seldom when treating dreams in general.
52 The present study highlighted the significance of THPs' dreams in the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness. Consequently, the approach of treatment in cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and the one applied in the current study differ dependent on the investigator's stance. The researcher's theoretical stance is ontologically grounded in the metaphysics of the study participants, which supports the adoption of an Afrocentric perspective.
3.5.3 Cultural criticism
Afrocentricity is a style of cultural critique that investigates the etymological origins of words and phrases to determine the origin of an author. This permits the interaction of ideas with actions and actions with ideas based on what is negative and constructive at the social, political, and economic levels. Ancestors, witchcraft, bones, culture, and spirits are the terms and ideas that dominate the contemporary research and qualify it for an Afrocentricity investigation. The African perspective on mental illness is broad, encompassing ancestors, folk belief, and witchcraft (Mkize, 2003). In the African setting and culture, all systems operate concurrently, making it simple for one individual to fit in and complement the THP (Mkize, 2003).
In essence, for African clients mental illness is perceived as something that must healed or managed, but rather as something that must be understood and accepted Mkize (2003) also emphasises that in the African setting, it is not a matter of describing the control mechanisms, but rather of comprehending their relevance. Mental disease is not merely a psychiatric problem in the African culture. This is due to the fact that African perception and experience indicate that it is a religious and/or cultural issue. For context, Mkize (2003) proposes that for the African therapist, signs are expressions of a struggle between the client and other humans, living or dead, including spirits. Therefore, such cultural critique arguments crucially situate the present study within the Afrocentricity paradigm.
53 3.5.4 Analytic Afrocentricity
Analytic Afrocentrism is the application of Afrocentric approach ideas to textual analysis. Understanding the principles of the Afrocentric approach in order to apply them as a guide in analysis and discourse is the consensus among Afrocentricity experts. If they are unable to pinpoint the phenomena in time and location, Afrocentricity researchers cannot operate as scientists effectively. This indicate that in some instances, the order of events is as important as place. The two parts of analysis are fundamental to any accurate comprehension of society, history, or personality. As a result, it is the responsibility of Afrocentricitrists to assess the extent to which the myths of society are portrayed as important or peripheral to society. This implies that any textual analysis must incorporate the tangible reality of lived experiences, making historical experiences a crucial aspect of Afrocentricity study. The investigation of Afrocentricity's attitude, direction, and language aims to reveal the author's imagination. This implies that the objective is to provide the author with a chance to convey his or her position on the topic.