The Contour and Meaning of Afrocentric Social Work

Afrocentric Approaches to Social Work

“…There were common themes: racism, oppression, powerlessness, and despair, all met with a spirit of unity and willingness to fight for the uplift of the community. Both in professional practice and social work literature, Black social workers began to discuss the need for an African-centered approach as numerous scholars began to articulate ways in which Afrocentricity could be applied to various forms of social work practice (Harvey, 1997;King, 1994;Swigorski, 1996;Schiele, 1997Schiele, , 1996Graham, 1999). But how was this best achieved and integrated within the discipline?…”

Rite of Passage Programs as Effective Tools for Fostering Resilience Among Low‐Income African American Male Adolescents

“…Distinguishable from mainstream Eurocentric values, African American culture reflects a reality in which knowing is experienced through emotion or feeling (i.e., knowledge is acquired through affect and experience). Also highly valued within the African American culture are interpersonal relationships, thus, African Americans are considered to be sociocentric (Schiele, 1994). These values are in contrast to the Western worldview that permeates the U.S. educational system (Banks, 1998;Grant & Lei, 2001).…”

Walking between worlds

“…Although social work emphasizes a culturally competent practice and an ethnic-sensitive approach to service delivery, these ideals are not always met (Hurdle, 2002;Weaver, 1999). Many critics argue that therapeutic knowledge and practice is still based on the dominant European-American worldview (Graham, 1999;Pinderhughes, 1989;Schiele, 1997). Graham (1999: 104), for example, contends that 'the core principles of social work that guide intervention methods such as ''social justice, equal interventions and selfdetermination'' ' are values that are hard to operationalize in diverse contexts because the social work knowledge base is still 'dominated by [a] Eurocentric worldview'.…”