Reframing Social Work with an Anti-Oppressive Lens: A Guide for Beginning Practitioners

This book is an essential and timely guide for beginning social workers practicing in diverse organizational settings. Applying an anti-oppressive, liberatory social justice lens to working with Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and other at-risk client populations, the book provides contemporary theoretical frameworks and practice approaches, rich clinical examples, and practice wisdom from expert social work clinicians and supervisors working with these populations. It is consistent with the most recent Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards (EPAS) and ethical principles from the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) to the understanding of agency-based work in the dominant fields of practice: child welfare, education, health, mental health, youth justice, carceral systems, substance use, intimate partner violence, racial and other traumas, palliative care, world of work, and older adults.

The book provides both an overview of practice in the aforementioned areas, as well as an in-depth look at intersubjective practice with the specific population. Each clinical chapter provides:

• the history of social work in the practice setting;
• an overview of the current research in the area;
• the predominant evidence-based practice approach(es) being used;
• the role(s) of the social worker in the specific setting and grounded in anti-oppressive and ethical clinical practice;
• an extensive case example and discussion, inclusive of the clinician's reflections and countertransference reactions;
• practice and supervisory wisdom offered by the authors as to how to negotiate the organizational system to best benefit their clients;
• evolving nature and future direction of the practice area; and
• reflection questions for students, instructors, and beginning clinicians.

Reframing Social Work with an Anti-Oppressive Lens offers a state-of-the-art overview of agency-based social work practice, consistent with the values and ethical principles of the profession. The book is primarily intended for social work students as well as beginning social workers and their supervisors who could also benefit from its contents. Chapters can readily be assigned in placement settings such that the supervisor-supervisee dyad can reflect on the core aspects of social work practice within their agency context.