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Strengths and weaknesses of social work theories
Strengths and weaknesses of social work theories
Reflection on cultural competence
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Thank you for your post. Your examples of how power and privilege can potentially influence practice were appropriate and necessary. You were expressive in your understanding of the issue and descriptive in your narrative. According to Carmelita Castaneda, multicultural competence requires and responds with knowledge and skill to communicate despite dissimilarities using commonalities as a medium to communicate compassion and understanding (Adams et al., 2013).
However, Johnson & Munich state that the means by which the social worker learn about the client's life, culture, and circumstances are contradictory to theories of cultural competence. (2009). Furthermore, problems by redefining conventional theories to acknowledge the client's view
Culture-bound values, in a simple term culture, consists of all those things people have learned in their history to do, believe, value, and enjoy (Sue, 2016, p. 218). It 's important in this category for one to express themselves, regarding the client. Also the social worker should read between the lines and observe what the client may not be saying. Focusing on the client individually, looking for verbal/emotional/behavioral expressiveness, insight, self-disclosure, scientific empiricism, distinctions between mental and physical functioning, and ambiguity, all fall under
Cultural Competence is a substantiated body of knowledge based of cultural “values held by a particular cultural group and the ability to cohesively adapt to individualized skills that fit the cultural context, thus, increasing relationships between employees, managements, and stakeholders, including patience and research subjects. Cultural competency is critical to reducing disparities and improving access to high-quality services, respectful of and responsive to the needs of diverse working conditions and individualized characteristics. The main focus emphasizes the understanding of cultural competence provide internal resources with skills and perceptions to thoroughly comprehend ones cultural attitude, increase the ability to multicultural diversity, and the ability to effectively interact with other cultures (Shelley Taylor, 2006, pp. 382-383), which is absent within the case study of Joe and Jill. Essentially speaking, principles of cultural competence are acknowledgement to the importance of culture in people's lives, respect for cultural differences, an...
I choose Chapter 4 Cultural Competence for the class discussion, and I addressed the following two points from the chapter. The first one was about Your Ethical Responsibility while working in the Human Service profession and the second was about Important Points to be Remember in Cross -Culture Interactions.
Cultural competence has to do with one’s culture. Culture affects among other factors, how children are raised, how families communicate, what is considered normal or abnormal, ways of coping with issues, the way we dress, when and where we seek medical treatment, and so forth. I should know because I come from a very cultural home where it is considered bad to talk to a male doctor about anything gynecological.
With the current change in demographics throughout the workforce, organizations are feeling the effects of a larger percentage of baby boomers retiring and a large percentage of millennial new entrants. The words used to describe millennial employees, “spoiled, trophy kids, ambitious”, seem to be as everlasting as the constructive and negative perspectives attached to them. Many can debate on the entitlement of these employees within an organization, how these employees can be groomed and managed to better fit the organization, the positive and negative attributes they bring into the workplace, and how the preceding can benefit or derail the effectiveness of an organization. Nonetheless, a harder debate, comes about in denying that organizations must adjust to and integrate these employees into the workforce.
There are different perspectives, however, which put stress on various aspects of culture and try to identify its boundaries and its substitutes. Some regard culture as separate entity from demographic factors, some point out acculturation as one of the obstacles, which makes culture difficult to identify, some show how an intimate and meaningful relationship between a counsellor and a culturally different client to be established. In this essay I will be discussing what the different concepts of understanding of culture in Counselling are, by examining different authors and perspectives and evaluating their strengths and weaknesses.
In understanding Relational Cultural Theory (RCT), we will first examine its fundamental assumptions and then critically assess those assumptions. Next, we will evaluate RCT’s assumptions to determine its relevance to the core values of social work. Finally, we will determine the ways RCT can best guide social work practice.
The empowerment perspective, “support[s] the development of innate abilities and recognize differences in a positive manner are also helping social workers increase the individual client’s capacity to learn to use his or her own systems constructively” (Empowerment, 2011). Meaning, it is when social workers would use the positivity of being different races and religions to help the client. For example, it would be recognizing that being black or Muslim is not a bad thing, but that there are numerous positives. To address the impact of classism, a social worker would “Help clients [to] better understand these contradictions [(that media and the world send them of what certain class’s attitudes, schemas and behaviors are like)] may help them understand” (Liu, 2005). Meaning, the social worker would help the client to understand the good attributes of being in a certain class, and how to obtain a higher class. Since the media often sends contradictions, such as saying “saving is important, but you have to spend to succeed” (Liu, 2005). Lastly, an understanding of the social construction of culture will be used in social work practice, since it could help a social worker to get a better understanding of their clients. Being, it could help them to better understand how their clients view themselves or how their clients feel society views them. Which can lead to the social worker understanding their clients lives and who their clients are, in a better
This paper will show the reader how social workers develop a theoretical orientation by first understanding assessing and understanding the client’s needs. For a social worker to been effective they must remember that they have to learn
Understanding of one’s self and being self knowledge is a critical step in not just achieving cultural competence but in that person life as a whole. Understand and being self knowledge will determine how that person will interact with others including strangers, and love ones. That will help the person understand what is important in life. Specially in the healthcare profession being cultural competence is extremely important, because nurses see patients from different part of the world with of course different culture that we have to understand in order to provide respectable, quality timely care to. Furthermore a nurse understanding and failure to acknowledge and to incorporate that patient culture into his care can and will effect the effectiveness
School completion rates for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students are well below the rates for non-Indigenous students. The target of halving the gap by 2020 in Year 12 (or equivalent) attainment rates between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students is a major national challenge. (Helme & Lamb 2011) In order to close this gap, I definitely find the capabilities approach relevant to the context of education. Using the Capabilities include a person’s education, their health, their job status, their income, their security, and so forth.
In social work, a social worker has to come to the client’s level and start from there. The client does not have to come to the social workers level. In order for this to happen the social worker has to know the importance of culture, race, gender, sexual, diversity and other forms of diversity to make the best decision for choosing a type of intervention. Understanding the client’s culture, race, gender, sexual diversity and other form of diversity is important because they affect each person differently. An example, Roberto is Latino and in their culture they believe in machomism, so this is something his social worker needs to know when addressing Roberto or someone of the Latino culture. Hispanic women bring machomism
Week five reading had a lot of usual information. Through week five reading I was able to reflect on culture. Summers (2016) discusses how important it is for a human service worker to have a balanced view of the client. This is because the worker must be able to view both the person and the person’s context or vital information and constructive opportunities will be lost. Part of having a balanced view of the client is to understand what the client brings to the situation and how that interacts with the client’s life (pp. 82-83). I learned the importance of understanding that different culture can greatly affect how I would need to balance my view of the client. Being able to view the person and the person’s context from their cultural perspective can help create a deeper understanding of the client’s situation and how their culture influences the situation and their life.
Empowerment can be defined as a technique employed by social workers to allow individuals to help themselves and regain social functioning. It helps them understand themselves as a person as well as give them the freedom to make decisions for them to become self-actualized. The social worker who is empowerment-focused aims to bring about social justice. Advocacy can be defined as the role given to a social worker who aims to bring awareness and interest to institutions about the needs of client/s. Since most times these institutions make it difficult for clients to access help, the social worker aims to bring about change in these institutions by sharing what the client’s needs and requests are, challenging the institution’s decision to not provide services and pushing for their adjustment of their policies overall. According to (Cross, 1988) cultural competence can be defined as a set of behaviours, attitudes and policies that enable a system, agency, or professional to function effectively across cultural difference. Cultural competence, does not solely recognise gender, race, ethnic background etc but it also recognises people who may have the same perspective or shared values and beliefs. Within the context of the agency, empowerment, advocacy and diversity/cultural competence
Also, cultural perspective helps social workers engage differences. Social workers can apply their understanding and realize the significant of variations in shaping life experiences from micro to macro levels. In other words, cultural competence helps social workers figure out the relationship between oppression and marginalization. So social worker can tackle the issues specifically. Hence, cultural perspectives help workers recognize themselves as learners and engage clients as experts of their own experiences. Thus, this can greatly build up the confidence of clients.