CHAPTER SIXCONTEMPORARY CONTEXT FOR FAMILY WORK

The Practice of Generalist Social Work (2nd ed.)

Key Ideas

Social workers work with many and varied types of family constellations.

Social workers need to remain open to evolving family definitions and forms.

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Grandparents Rearing Grandchildren

In many cultures, grandparents play a significant role in child rearing.

Industrialization has impacted grandparents’ child-rearing roles.

Changing contemporary issues have increased the need for grandparents to resume or continue their roles in child rearing.

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Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Parents

Many recent legal, technological, and other developments have transformed parenting issues and opportunities for sexual minority groups.

Various obstacles related to parenting remain for sexual minority groups.

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Single-Parent Families

Single parenthood still has many negative connotations associated with it.

Current literature has not been able to support or validate many commonly held negative beliefs about single parenthood.

Still, single parenthood does bring many unique challenges.

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Families of Multiple Racial and Ethnic Heritages

An increasingly diverse society has brought increasingly diverse family systems.

Diverse family systems have unique strengths and challenges.

Posture of cultural reciprocity is one approach to working with diverse family systems.

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Families with Persons with Disabilities

Many families have members who have physical, cognitive, and/or psychological disabilities.

These families have many unique strengths and challenges.

The strengths perspective is a helpful approach to use in work with these families.

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Blended Families

Blended families are the result of many circumstances including remarriage, civil unions, and domestic partnerships.

Blended families can face many challenges as two separate systems are combined to form a new system.

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International Families

Migration has impacted family constellations, dynamics, and issues.

Social workers need to be aware of legal, cultural, political, economic, and other factors that can impact international families.

© 2011 Taylor & Francis