This expertly written book provides an accessible framework for culturally competent practice with children and families in child maltreatment cases. Numerous workable strategies and concrete examples are presented to help readers address cultural concerns at each stage of the assessment and intervention process. Professionals and students learn new ways of thinking about their own cultural viewpoints as they gain critical skills for maximizing the accuracy of assessments for physical and sexual abuse; overcoming language barriers in parent and child interviews; respecting families' values and beliefs while ensuring children's safety; creating a welcoming agency environment; and more.
Lisa Aronson Fontes, PhD, is on the faculty of the University Without Walls at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She has dedicated two decades to making the social service, mental health, criminal justice, and medical systems more responsive to culturally diverse people. Dr. Fontes has published widely on cultural issues in child maltreatment and violence against women, cross-cultural research, and ethics. She has worked as a family, individual, and group psychotherapist, and has conducted research in Santiago, Chile, and with Puerto Ricans, African Americans, and European Americans in the United States. She also worked for three years with Somali refugees. In 2007 Dr. Fontes was awarded a Fulbright Foundation Fellowship, which she completed in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Fluent in Spanish and Portuguese, she is a frequent conference speaker and workshop facilitator.
Table of Contents
1. Multicultural Orientation to Child Maltreatment Work 2. Working with Immigrant Families Affected by Child Maltreatment 3. Assessing Diverse Families for Child Maltreatment 4. Interviewing Diverse Children and Families about Maltreatment 5. Physical Discipline and Abuse 6. Child Sexual Abuse 7. Working with Interpreters in Child Maltreatment 8. Child Maltreatment Prevention and Parent Education 9. Improving the Cultural Competency of Your Child Maltreatment Agency or Organization
Interviews
Social workers, clinical and school psychologists, family therapists, child welfare personnel, and other mental health and human service providers working with children and families; students and trainees in these fields. Serves as a text in undergraduate- or graduate-level courses in social work practice with children, child abuse, case management, child psychology, and practice with diverse clients.
