Main description:

Students, beginning and seasoned mental health professionals will be better prepared for diversity practice by this accessible, timely, provocative, and critical work, The Convergence of Race, Ethnicity and Gender: Multiple Identities in Counseling, Fifth Edition. Author Tracy Robinson-Wood demonstrates, through both the time honored tradition of storytelling and clinically-focused case studies, the process of patient and therapist transformation. This insightful, practical resource offers behavioral health professionals a nuanced view of diversity beyond race, culture, and ethnicity to include and interrogate intersectionality among race, culture, gender, sexuality, age, class, nationality, religion, and disability. With a keen focus on quality patient care, this important text aims to help professionals better serve patients across sources of diversity. Readers will recognize their roles and responsibilities as social justice agents of change, while identifying the ways in which dominant cultural beliefs and values furnish and perpetuate clients' feelings of stuckness and inadequacy, in both the therapeutic alliance and within the larger society. This remarkable text reveres the lifelong commitment of using knowledge and skills as power for good to make a meaningful difference in people's lives.

Contents:

Part I: The Mental Health Professional and Diversity
Chapter 1: You, The Mental Health Professional, and Diversity in Mental Health Practice
The Mental Health Profession
Chapter 2: Multicultural Competencies: Knowledge, Skills, and Attitudes
Multicultural Competencies
Competency Guidelines, Benchmarks, and Standards
Diversity Training
Assessment and Research
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 3: Multiple Identities
Multicultural Counseling and Psychology Defined
Diversity: An Overview
A B C Dimensions
Conceptualization of the Self
Images of Diversity
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 4: Identities as Status
Identities as Status: The Contextual and Social Construction of Differences Model
Assumptions of Hierarchical Socialization Patterns
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Part II: Our People
Chapter 5: People of Native American and Alaskan Native Descent
History
Geography and Demography
Social, Psychological, and Physical Health Issues
Acculturation
Cultural Philosophies and Values
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 6: People of Spanish and Latino Descent
The Spanish, Portuguese, Indians, Asians, and Africans
Migratory Patterns from Mexico
Demography
Geography
Social, Psychological, and Physical Health Issues
Migration and Acculturation
Cultural Orientation and Values
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 7: People of African Descent
History, 500-1500 AD
The Slave Trade
Resistance to Slavery
Demographic Trends
Social, Psychological, and Physiological Health Issues
Cultural Orientation and Values
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 8: People of Asian Descent, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders
History
Demography
Social, Psychological, and Physical Health Issues
Acculturation and Experiences in America
Cultural Orientation and Values
Asian American Identity Development
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 9: People of the Middle East and Arab Americans
The Africans, Asians, Europeans, and Arabs
Muslims and Arabs: Differences and Similarities
Migratory Patterns from the Middle East
Demography
U.S. Census Bureau Classification as White
Social, Psychological, and Physical Health Issues
Cultural Orientation and Values
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 10: People of European Descent
History and Immigration
Geography and Demography
Social, Psychological, and Physical Health Issues
The Meaning of Whiteness
White Racial Identity Development
White Privilege and Colorblindness
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 11: People of Jewish Descent
History of Migragration and Accultration
Defining Judaism
The Meaning of Being Jewsih
Shoah (The Holocaust)
Demography
Social, Psychological, and Physical Health Issues
Cultural Orientation and Values
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Part III: Converging Identities
Chapter 12: Converging Race
The Social Construction of Race
Race and Science
Origins of Racial Groups
On Race, Ethnicity, and Difference
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 13: Converging Biracial and Multicultural Identities
Definitions
Demography
The One-Drop Rule
The Fluidity of Race
Racial Socialization
Multiracial and Biracial Identity Development
Research and Biracial and Multiracial Populations
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 14: Converging Gender
Gender Definitions
Gender and Biology
The Social Construction of Gender
Undoing Gender
Sex and Gender Roles
Gender and Emotion
Gender and the Body
Gender and Experiences in Therapy
Gender Identity Models
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 15: Converging Sexuality
Definitions and Terminology
Narrative Questions
The Importance of a Focus on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Issues in Mental Health Diversity
Developmental Processes
Counseling LGBT Populations of Color
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 16: Converging Socioeconomic Class
The Invisibility of Class as a Variable in Counseling
The Intersection of Class
Class: An Identity Construct
Middle-Class Bias and Counselor Training
The Fluidity of Class
Middle-Class Bias and Ethical Standards
Classism
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 17: Converging Disability
Understanding Disability
Disabilities and Children in Schools
Adults and Disabilities
Veterans
Disability Studies
The Social Construction of Disability
Alzheimers
Perfection, Beauty, and the Able Body
Implications for Counselors and Psychologists
Case Study
Chapter 18: Converging Spirituality
Spirituality and Religion Defined
Spirituality, Therapy, and Cultural Considerations
Diverse Healing Strategies
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study
Chapter 19: Converging Social Justice in Diversity Practice
Social Justice and Empowerment
Power and Powerlessness
Social Justice and the Therapeutic Process
Feminist Therapy and Social Justice
Patient Navigation: Social Justice Example
Implications for Mental Health Professionals
Case Study