Fred CoxSenior Research & Innovation Consultant
Fred
Empathy Warrior, Culture Curator, Contextualizer of Truth
What do you do?
Connect the live experience of consumers with historical context to provide modern contemporary insight. There is nothing new under the sun and most of our current lived experiences are results of systems. I believe that history is the best predictor of future and so I leverage it to explain the way in which innovation manifests today.
What's your background?
My professional background includes facilitating and moderating focus groups rooted in social justice issues for educational institutions and non profits. With a sociology and women/gender studies framework, I center the historical experiences of the Black consumer to manifest more authentic insights.
I specialize in CPGs and brand positioning clients invested in strengthening their understanding and building relationships with multicultural consumers.
Favorite book, quote or song?
My favorite books currently are Boy Crisis and Adult Children of Emotionally Absent Parents.
Boy Crisis is a psychology based theory that addresses a purpose void in boys/men that do not fit within society’s expectation of men to be the protector/provider role. It encourages boys/men to operate with a Health Intelligence, in which they make decisions in the best interest of their holistic health rather than stretching themselves to be a protector/provider for their communities. This idea suggests that men are more of an asset to their communities than a protector/provider.
Adult Children of Emotionally Absent Parents allowed me to assess the emotional voids attained during childhood. These voids manifest in adult romantic relationships and hold a mirror to the emotional needs of the adults within them. After reading this, there were two revelations that peaked: 1) My parents too had emotional voids that they may have projected onto me 2) I internalize my emotions rather than practicing boundaries. Since then, I attempt to strengthen my emotional maturity and work to fill them myself rather than others accountable for the way in which I show up.
Something you’ve found inspiring?
I’ve been pondering about WEB DuBois theory of Double-consciousness, which is a concept in social philosophy referring, originally, to a source of inward “twoness” putatively experienced by African-Americans because of their racialized oppression and disvaluation in a white-dominated society. This theory was emphasized in James Baldwin’s novel, Nobody Knows My Name, where he presents that the only commonality between all Black people in the world is their “ache to come into the world as a man,” separate from his history with the White man.
These two theories leave me to question the ability for Black humans to find independence from the history, physical and psychological, of oppression. Specifically, as I attempt to consider what I could offer to these historical theories that would allow Black humans to navigate differently in the future.