For Their Own Good? : Sex work, social control and social workers, a historical perspective

This article provides an overview of the social responses to prostitution since the mid 1800s and how the responses of social workers have been shaped by shifting social contexts. Understanding the complex interplay of these forces is key to mapping out the divergent social work practice approaches with sex workers and their influence over time. The article presents three main constructs which have influenced social work responses to sex work; 1) the notion that women needed to be protected for their own good, 2) competing class values and, 3) social control

Teaching Social Justice in Dangerous Times: Practices of hope

Over the course of 20 years of learning and teaching social justice, I have learned that without practices of hope, both in and out of the classroom, my students and I get easily frustrated, impatient, we feel powerless to affect change. We /I’ve learned this same lesson as the daughter of a Palestinian refugee living in the diaspora, I’ve learned this as an immigrant, a queer cis-woman, as someone with access to multiple forms of privilege engaged in anti-violence movements for decades. I’ve arrived at these practices of hope by muddling and stumbling (I’ve got the teaching evaluations to prove it) through learning how to teach social justice content to social work students, while being complicit and implicated myself in systems of oppression as a social worker, service provider, as an academic and beneficiary of systems of oppression. I owe my lessons to systems of formal and informal accountability to students, colleagues, and a range of communities where the feedback and correction I’ve received has often been uncomfortable and difficult

Reflections on Teaching Against White Supremacy During a Time of Social Rupture and Transformation

Social Justice and Social Work is a foundational course required for all social work students in the master’s of social work program at Portland State University. Although the course has long focused on interrupting oppressions including White supremacy, teaching the course during the fall of 2020 required a nimble dance between our familiar modes of teaching and the need for spontaneous adaptation and creativity. The unique landscape for this course included teaching the course remotely (Zoom), inside a university embattled around the arming of its security force (that killed a Black man in 2018), in a city targeted by an armed federal response to the racial uprising led by Black Lives Matter, in a state with a long history of White supremacy and Black exclusion, and under a federal administration explicitly aligned with White supremacy. This paper offers a reflection of our teaching about and against White supremacy during this unique moment in time. We position our writing at the intersections of teaching and activism, of hope and uncertainty. It is from our shared commitment to the abolishment of White supremacy that the following tenets were derived, grounding our experimental teaching in complexity, complicity, and social transformation: (1) remembering for the future, (2) attending to collective grief and rage, (3) bringing the streets (racial uprising) into the classroom, and (4) repurposing the classroom for social transformation

Hybrid Chronicles: Biracial and Biethnic Perspectives on the Pedagogy of Unlearning Racism

This article details an autoethnography project of our odysseys into the pedagogy of unlearning racism. Our know ledge creation process forced us to re-envision both our locations in, and pedagogy of, anti-racism work, with particular attention to the challenges and dangers of teaching about, to, and from White privilege within social work. In the end, we are both troubled and invigorated by what we experienced, witnessed, and supported. By asking people of color to share their personal narratives of racism in the presence of Whites, teachers, facilitators, and diversity trainers stand to continue privileging Whiteness where Whites benefit and learn at the expense of people of color

A Green New Deal for Social Work

In this editorial, we consider what climate action would mean for the social work profession. The urgency to address climate change compels social work practitioners, educators, and researchers to embrace a vision of social work that is committed to restoring human well-being and the natural world

Student-Perceived Quality of Motivational Interviewing Training: A Factor-Analytic Study

Objective: This study developed and tested a student-report measure of motivational interviewing (MI) teaching quality called the Evaluation of Motivational Interviewing Teaching (EMIT) scale. Method: Social work students (N = 297) receiving course content on motivational interviewing completed the EMIT, and exploratory factor analysis investigated whether theory-based dimensions of teaching emerged as EMIT subscales, including: interactivity/skill building, MI content coverage, modeling MI during teaching, trainee autonomy violation, and encouraging ongoing training in MI. Results: Two subscales emerged representing MIconsistent (28 items, α = .92) and MI-inconsistent teaching practices (7 items, α = .73). Conclusions: Although more research is needed on the EMIT, this study supports the initial reliability of the instrument and can help social work educators evaluate MI teaching qualit

Strengths-Based Practice and Motivational Interviewing

There has been recent concern that many practices and programs erroneously claim to be strengths-based. In reaction some have called for researchers to make systematic comparisons to the tenets of strengths-based practice (SBP) before making the contention that an intervention is strengths-based. Motivational interviewing (MI) is an intervention which has been described as being strengths-based; however, no systematic efforts have yet been made to compare the two. This article takes a methodical approach to comparing SBP and MI to determine level of cohesion and how they might be used together. A case-example is used to illustrate how MI and SBP may be used in conjunction and implications for social work practice and education are discussed

“Build a Friendship With Them”: The Discourse of “At-Risk” as a Barrier to Relationship Building Between Young People Who Trade Sex and Social Workers

Young people in statutory care and protection interact with social workers, who hold potential to provide a supportive adult role in their lives. Many however, run away at an early age and end up on the street trading sex for money or other favours. There is potential to improve outcomes for young people in care if the relationship between young people and their social workers is better addressed. This paper uses data from a qualitative study of 14 young people who traded sex and who had experienced interactions with social workers. A thematic analysis identified three themes: the rigidity of social work practice; contesting the family situation; and resisting the at-risk label. We argue that to have any impact on outcomes for young people in care, social workers need to prioritise relationship-building above the need to conform to organizational protocols and guidelines. Such guidelines assist the social worker in assessing whether family situations pose high risk for a young person, but the “at-risk” label is contested by young people, which results in a lack of trust and a barrier to relationship building