Essay on Families as Navigators and Negotiators

The foundation of human development, responds to the breakdown of its commitment to the development of attitudes and skills, which facilitate authentic personal, spiritual, and social development and the transformation throughout an individual’s life span. During an individual’s life span, the foundations of human development begin to change, as the direct result of the social environment. Contact within the social environment, such as various relationships with others, causes growth and change in human development. The understanding of culture and the importance of cultural competency are

According to the author McCubbin in Karen Seccombe’s article “‘Beating the Odds’ Versus ‘Changing the Odds’: Poverty, Resilience, and Family Policy” he says that “It can be defined as the capacity to rebound from adversity, misfortune, trauma, or other transitional crises strengthened and more resourceful” (385). McCubbins point is that resiliency is to bounce back from any “crises” or “misfortune” in a person’s life. Being resilient is to keep moving forward from any bad events. For example some factor work with a person’s resiliency such as a good parental bond, good community, and a role model.

Resilience is a term that is often applied to those who have faced hardship and viewed the experience in a positive light as an opportunity to grow and change for the better (Wagnild & Collins, 2009). The definition however seems to vary from place to place. Ungar et al. (2008) stated “definitions of resilience are ambiguous when viewed across cultures" (p.174) which is why the understanding of resilience may be difficult to capture (as cited in Windle, Bennett & Noyes, 2011). Although the literature agrees on several common themes about resilience there are many varying opinions on how to define the concept or the attributing factors. Earvolino-Ramirez (2007) and

Culture has an effect on behavior based on the beliefs, values, and norms accepted in that culture. To understand a client’s behavior, it’s important to understand their culture and the influences it has on the client. By understanding culture and analyzing it through one or more sociocultural lenses, social workers can understand how society perceives clients and how clients view themselves (Rogers, 2016). According to NASW standard 1.01a (1999), social workers need to understand how culture influences human behavior and society. To efficiently work with clients and understand their behavior, a social worker needs to view a client through an applicable sociocultural lens.

Cultural identity is fluid and is developed through multidimensional aspects of one’s lived experiences, socially constructed ideals and perceptions of self. The African culture, similar to the Hawaiian culture is embedded and passed down through the creative arts. Thus, one identifies aspects of themselves through music, dance and other expressive

In The Way We Never Were, Stephanie Coontz suggests that society romanticizes past generations of family life and points out that these memories are merely myths that prevent us from “dealing more effectively with the problems facing today’s families” (Coontz x). Coontz proposes that researchers can take empirical data and create misleading causality for that data, thus feeding cultural myth and/or experience. Coontz believes that “an overemphasis on personal responsibility for strengthening family values encourages a way of thinking that leads to moralizing rather than mobilizing for concrete reforms” (Coontz 22). She calls on us to direct our attention to social reforms, which can be accomplished by avoiding victim-blaming

In many ways family systems theory can be seen as a broad field where there many different implications that make up the system, it is a system. A system is a set of objects that are bound together by a relationship, which are based around the attributes of the objects as drawn upon by (Janet.BB, 1982). Family systems theory addresses the many different ideals and values that make up a typical family, these include the roles each member of the family, the power relations either from the male of the family or both parents of the family, the boundaries that are set within the family to ensure that the structure of the family is secure, in both individualistic and collectivist families this can be seen (Fred Rothbaum, 2002).

It is imperative that social workers become knowledgeable about their clients’ cultures and are culturally sensitive. In learning about their clients’ cultures, social workers need to be aware of how powerful and significant culture is in relating to clients’ behavior, values, and beliefs. Becoming culturally competent requires the ability to integrate awareness, knowledge, and skills while maintaining a positive working relationship with the client (Sue and Zane, 1987). Today, the concerns regarding cultural competency continue to accentuate the importance of preparing social workers for a diversified society.

TITLE OF ASSIGNMENT: Discuss how social care workers might utilise resiliency theories and frameworks to meet the needs and enhance the life skills of a group of clients in their care. Your discussion should draw on relevant theoretical frameworks and be applied to a particular social care setting of your choice.

Similarly, David Wakefield & Cynthia Hudley (2009) supports the notion of family, cultural, and racial identity as major developmental factors for mental health and well-being whereby they argue that Identity and the development of cultural identity can translate to positive mental health outcomes. Additionally, Tara Yosso (2006) supports the idea that family and culture are imperative by highlighting the relationship culture plays to Pierre Bourdieu’s (Gauntlett, 2011) theory of social capital as a main resource that is used by an individual or group. Bourdieu (Gauntlett, 2011) postulates that capital by virtue of networking relationships of acquaintance and recognition can be an exclusionary mechanism locking out what is considered the inferior social capital and maintaining the dominant discourse of a

     The central theme of this essay is empowerment and the roles that parents, schools and professionals take on in the quest for the best educational decisions for those children with disabilities and those children that are gifted and talented. It is important to understand the historical development of family-professional relationships to fully comprehend the significance how far we’ve come and how far we still need to go.

In her book The Unfinished Revolution, Kathleen Gerson argues that today, family pathways are more important than family structure. In this context, family structure refers to the organization of a family, and the way that it has been changing as a result of the gender revolution. For example, some nontraditional family structures that are explored in the book include double parent families with both parents earning, single parent families (mostly single mothers), and families with same-sex parents. Gerson argues that while family structures are not negligible, it is family pathways that are more important for the children of the gender revolution. That is to say, the children value the dynamics of their family more than the structure. They are more concerned about how well their parents are able to provide them with the necessary emotional and financial support than they are about how well their families follow a norm. For them, it is more about feeling like they’re part of a family rather than just physically being in one. Gerson emphasizes this when she explains that the people she interviewed “focused on the long-term consequences of parental choices, not on the specific form or type of home these choices produced at any one moment in time.” One important implication of this argument is the way in which the children of the gender revolution imagine their own romantic relationships unfolding. Even there, they prioritize a feeling rather than a format. For example, one

Family structure in the United States has undergone a dramatic change since the 1960's. The percentage of female-headed households increased while the percentage of married couple households declined. This paper uses data from the Urban Underclass Database to explain the roles the transforming economy (from manufacturing to service) and the subsequent employment dislocation play in the family structure change. Results for the largest 100 cities in the United States find support for a relationship between changes in the economy, subsequent male unemployment, and family

First of all, I would like to define what resilience is. Major scholars believe it is the process to recover from trauma, or the ability to respond to adversity. According to Sergeant and Laws-Chapman (2012), resilience refers to “the ability to adapt to adverse conditions while maintaining a sense of purpose, balance, and positive mental and

There are several key processes discussed in the Family Resilience chapter, in the text, such as the family belief system, organizational patterns, and communication. These processes help the family deal with stress, adjust to changes, and learn ways to cope with difficult situations. Within these processes, there is a framework, which focuses on family resilience. This family resilience framework emphasizes the families’ ability to adapt/adjust to significant influences and/or situations (Walsh, 2016).