Winner of the 2015 Educational Publishing Awards Australia - Scholarly Resource Most people of European background are not aware that they see the world through the lens of the Western tradition, but for Indigenous people, it can seem like a foreign language. Indigenous ways of thinking and working are grounded in many thousands of years of oral tradition, and continue among Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people today. Lorraine Muller shows that understanding traditional holistic approaches to social and emotional wellbeing is essential for practitioners working with Indigenous clients across the human services. She explores core principles of traditional Indigenous knowledge in Australia, including relatedness, Country, circular learning, stories, and spirituality. She then shows how these principles represent a theory for Indigenous practice. A Theory for Indigenous Australian Health and Human Service Work offers a deep insight into Indigenous Australian ways of working with people, in the context of a decolonisation framework. It is an invaluable resource for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous practitioners and researchers in health, social work, community work, education and related fields. 'In today's global environment, where Indigenous Peoples continue to fight for self-determination, Muller's work is an exemplary model of Indigenous self- determination. It is bound to be a foundational model of Indigenous practice in field of health and well-being.' - Michael Hart, Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Knowledges and Social Work, University of Manitoba 'Lorraine Muller's work covers some centrally important issues for those that work with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and who want to understand indigenous knowledge frameworks.' - Dr Mark Wenitong, Apunipima Cape York Health Council

Practitioners in the helping professions today operate in challenging settings where budgets have been cut dramatically, and progression and success are too often defined primarily by key performance indicators and strategic outcomes. Tensions arise when such pressures conflict with helping professionals' core responsibilities to provide excellent care, advocate for patients or service users and to seek social justice. This book introduces a critical model for supervision which addresses not only the human relationships and interactions involved in work, but also the financial, political and managerial environment in which the work is carried out. It identifies how reflective practice alone is not enough to bring about transformational change, and outlines how practitioners can learn in and through supervision, drawing on ideas from critical pedagogy and organisational learning. Practice examples are included to demonstrate the use of this approach within contemporary human service environments. Providing a new approach for effective supervision, this book will be of interest to practitioners, managers, researchers, academics and students working across the human services, including health care, social services and criminal justice.

This book problematises and then reshapes critical social work to bring a range of perspectives to what constitutes truly effective and ethical social work practice, moving beyond binary oppositions (where two states or concepts are defined as opposite to each other) to create new words and concepts to be inclusive of a range of identities, practice contexts, and groups or communities of service users. Currently, critical social work, derived from sociological critical theories proliferated in the 1960s, enjoys dominance as the theory that encompasses the ethical principles of social work in Australia. While on the surface critical social work appears to align with the Australian Association of Social Workers’ (AASW) ethical principles of social justice, professional integrity, and respect for persons, practitioners, and students alike find enacting it can be problematic in complex practice situations. Reporting original research of cases from the field, the book focuses on the impact of intersectionality and shows new ways to address the nuance of othering and modern-day colonialism. It will be of interest to researchers, practitioners, and students who are keen to engage with the latest in the field of critical social work and consider implications of this for the development of their own identity.

Practice Skills in Social Work and Welfare has established itself as the essential text to prepare students for the wide-ranging challenges they will face in today's human service sector. This new third edition continues the text's core strength of combining grounded theory with practical examples to build the reader's confidence and expertise in key areas of practice. Part I outlines the anti-oppressive and strengths-based practices that underpin the book's approach and provides the context for learning practice skills in a group setting, during community development projects and with individuals. Part II focuses on developing effective relationships with clients, illustrating through realistic scenarios how social work and human service workers can apply their practice skills in a range of settings. In Part III the essential elements of client assessment are explored, including risk assessment and cross-cultural perspectives. Issues surrounding intervention are examined in Part IV from working with families and groups to challenging constructively and safely, while research, evaluation and facilitating closure are covered in the final part. This third edition is fully revised and updated, and features new material on using information technology, working with Indigenous Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and Maori, and engaging with families in the statutory system. 'The main strength of the book is the consistency of its themes throughout the text.' - Karen Heycox in Australian Social Work

In 2013, the International Indigenous Voices in Social Work Conference was held in Winnipeg, Canada, with Indigenous and non-Indigenous participants from all over the world. This book is a collaboration of works stemming from this conference, and reflects the conference’s theme of Indigenous Knowledges: resurgence, implementation and collaboration. As Indigenous scholars and practitioners and non-Indigenous allies, the contributors here see the importance of Indigenous Knowledges for social work and related professions. Furthermore, they recognize that the colonial structures that are in place throughout the globe can only be dismantled through reliance on Indigenous knowledges and practices. This book makes a leading and impactful contribution to these anti-colonial and Indigenist efforts.

Informed by original ground-breaking research, this book “shifts the lens” of study, identifying how Indigenous Australian values and principles have influenced and contributed to an evolving non-Indigenous mainstream Australian culture. Based on the Indigenous principle of respect, Muller presents a solid research framework to break down the barriers of social differences in a culturally safe space. The text offers an insight into the cultural aspects of modern Australian society that contributed to its globally acclaimed handling of the current coronavirus pandemic. During the preparation for dealing with the pandemic, Muller’s research was validated as the world witnessed the Australian culture undergoing major change, shifting away from the original colonialist culture based on individuality and social stratification, to a community collective-based culture. It will be a valuable read for scholars in the area of community and allied health, humanities, social policy, social sciences and political studies. People seeking alternative lifestyles, a decolonised future and social change will also find this book useful. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons [Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND)] 4.0 license.

Critical social work encourages emancipatory personal and social change. This text focuses on the challenge of incorporating critical theory into the practice of social workers and provides case studies and insights from a range of fields to illustrate how to work with tensions and challenges. Beginning with an outline of the theoretical basis of critical social work and its different perspectives, the authors go on to introduce key features of working in this tradition including critical reflection. Part II explores critical practices in confronting privilege and promoting social justice in social work, examining such issues as human rights, gender, poverty and class. Part III considers the development of critical practices within the organisational context of social work including the fields of mental health, child and family services, within Centrelink and prison settings. Part IV is focused on doing anti- discriminatory and anti-oppressive practice in social work with particular populations including asylum seekers, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, domestic violence survivors, older people and lesbian, gay and transgender groups. Finally, Part V outlines collectivist and transformative practices in social work and beyond, looking at environmental issues, social activism, the disability movement and globalisation. 'A highly valuable addition to social work education and practice literature in Australia and beyond its shores.' Ruth Phillips, Associate Professor, Faculty of Education and Social Work, University of Sydney