This book describes and documents the existence of the black helping tradition, and offers a theory regarding its origin, development, and decline. The book is based on research operating from the fundamental assumption that a pattern of black self-help activities developed from the black extended family, particularly the extended family's major elements of mutual aid, social-class cooperation, male-female equality, and prosocial behavior in children; and that the pattern of black self-help spread from the black extended family to institutions in the wider black community through fictive kinship and racial and religious consciousness.
With numerous selections designed to reinforce the goal of empowering clients to take charge of their lives, this revised and updated second edition of The Black Family serves a two-fold purpose. It extends the small but growing body of strength-oriented literature to include African-American families and it serves as a natural extension of current texts on African-American families to provide social workers and the education community with a broader framework for understanding the needs of Black families. Offering both a research orientation and a practice perspective, this book should appeal to social work educators and practitioners involved in family services, health and mental health settings, and child and public welfare.
With this purported new "era of high-profile, mega successful, black women who are changing the face of every major field worldwide" and growing socioeconomic diversity among black women as the backdrop, Embracing Sisterhood seeks to determine where contemporary black women's ideas of black womanhood and sisterhood merge with social class status to shape certain attachments and detachments among them. Similarities as well as variations in how black women of different social backgrounds perceive and live black womanhood are interpreted for a range of social contexts. This book confirms what many of today's African-American women and interested observers have known for some time: Conceptions and experience of black womanhood are quite diverse and appear to have grown more diverse over time. However, the potential for a pervasive and polarizing black "step-sisterhood" is considerably undermined by the passion with which these women cling to the promises of cross-class gender/ethnic "community" and of group determination. Embracing Sisterhood draws its analysis from in-depth interviews with eighty-eight contemporary black women aged 18 to 89 covering a variety of issues prompted by a survey questionnaire capturing various dimensions of gender/ethnic identity and consciousness.
Voices of Color: First Person Accounts of Ethnic Minority Therapists is the first book to address the training, academic, and professional experiences of ethnic minority therapists. Using real cases, narratives, and biographical material, each chapter motivates the reader to ponder and challenge how issues related to mental health intersect with race/ethnicity within a broader diversity framework. The contributors represent various mental health disciplines, and they all write from a systemic perspective on therapy cases, theory, new models, and research. The authors present powerful narratives of how their personal and professional experiences inform each other. These insider perspectives are placed within a broader systemic context highlighting the interplay between personal, academic, and professional political relationships and their symbiotic impact on individuals, families, and communities. These combined voices of color add a new and significant perspective to the awareness of students, clinicians, educators, supervisors, and administrators regarding their personal position vis-à-vis psychotherapy, different multicultural dimensions, and social justice.
This comprehensive examination of therapy with children from ethnic minorities introduces a culturally-relevant theoretical framework to aid appropriate assessment and therapeutic guidelines for work with such clients. After an introductory discussion of principles to be considered with ethnic minority children and adolescents, the author systematically applies these principles to therapy. Distinctive cultural values of child development and family functioning of each ethnic group discussed are explored. To illustrate cultural-specific intervention strategies, Ho includes several case vignettes.
In Human Behavior in the Social Environment from an African American Perspective, leading black scholars come together to discuss complex human behavior problems faced by African Americans and to force the abandonment of conceptualization theories made without consideration of the Black experience. Challenging you to engage in different thinking and develop new theories for addressing the needs of African Americans, this book highlights the assets of black individuals, families, and communities and guides you through program interventions and public policies that strengthen and empower African Americans. You will learn to enhance your clients’coping strategies and resilience by factoring in their strengths rather than focusing on their weaknesses. Human Behavior in the Social Environment from an African American Perspective contextualizes community behavior patterns, gender roles, and changing contemporary identities to challenge your assumptions about African American culture and communities and convince you to rethink your intervention strategies and methods. To further help you fine-tune your service delivery, this book leads you through discussions on: help-seeking behaviors of young street males the association of sociocultural risk factors with suicides the use of emotive behavior therapy to help African Americans cope with the prospect of imminent death advocating for changes in institutions and systems which negatively impact the lives of the poor and the oppressed how social work has ignored one segment of the African American community--young girls in urban settings psychological consequences of coming of age in a hostile environment Social workers, community-based groups, policymakers, and other helping professionals owe it to their clients to shrug off culturally incompetent services and care. Using Human Behavior in the Social Environment from an African American Perspective as a guide, you will learn to redress your programs and policies with a sensitivity to the factors and mechanisms that maximize the buoyancy of disadvantaged groups over various stages of their life development.
New Approaches to Family Practice takes current research driven by the family systems theoretical framework and applies it to direct practice with families in three specific areas: paid work and family-work, unemployment, and poverty. To illustrate the links from research to practice, the book presents chapters on the theory and research in each of the three target areas, each followed by a chapter on application and tools for direct practice in that area.
The experiences of African Americans in urban communities are distinct from those of other ethnic groups, and to be truly understood require an in-depth appreciation of the interface between micro- and macro-level factors. This sweeping text, an outgrowth of a groundbreaking urban social work curriculum, focuses exclusively on the African American experience through field education, community engagement, and practice. It presents a framework for urban social work practice that encompasses a deep understanding of the challenges faced by this community. From a perspective based on empowerment, strengths, resilience, cultural competence, and multiculturalism, the book delivers proven strategies for social work practice with the urban African American population. It facilitates the development of creative thinking skills and the ability to "meet people where they are" skills that are often necessary for true transformation to take root. The book describes an overarching framework for understanding and practicing urban social work, including definitions and theories that have critical implications for working with people in such communities. It encompasses the contributions of African American pioneers regarding a response to such challenges as poverty, oppression, and racism. Focusing on the theory, practice, and policy aspects of urban social work, the book examines specific subsets of the urban African American population including children, adults, families, and older adults. It addresses the challenges of urban social work in relation to public health, health, and mental health; substance abuse; criminal justice; and violence prevention. Additionally, the book discusses how to navigate the urban built environment and the intersection between African Americans and other diverse groups. Chapters include outcome measures of effectiveness, case studies, review questions, suggested activities, and supplemental readings. KEY FEATURES: Fills a void in the literature on urban social work practice with African Americans Presents the outgrowth of a renowned urban curriculum, field education, research, community engagement, and practice Fulfills the requirements of the CSWE in the Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards regarding diversity Synthesizes micro, mezzo, and macro content in each chapter Provides contributions from African American pioneers in urban social work practice Accompanying Instructor's Manual and PowerPoint Slides
