Social work ideas from India to the US showcases increasing cultural translation

Gurid Aga Askeland and I argue in our book on Globalisation and International Social Work that people should aim at 'cultural translation'. That is, they should write about ideas in ways that are can be used in other cultures. When you do this, you have to recognise that your ideas will be changed by the other culture. But this is enriching, because when they come back to you, they give another perspective on your original idea. Increasingly, we are beginning to see this, as people from other countries publish in Western countries about social work elsewhere: this can only enrich social work in Europe and the US where people think that they have nothing to learn from other cultures and 'poor' countries. I argued this in my recent speech at the Stockholm world conference on social work and social development.

I see Lyceum are publicising a book by Sweta Singh, an Indian social worker in the US, who is writing about how holistic practice and Hindu ideas taken from his Indian heritage can be used in his adopted country.

Link to the publisher's website.

Social work student in Slovenia experiences a week of growing old

Špela is a student at the Faculty for Social Work in Ljubljana in Slovenia, and she spent a week with an older person to get experience of how interesting it can be as an older person. This is the kind of experience every social work student should have.

See Špela’s blog about her experience here: Living with Veronika for a week

This is all part of the HelpAge International campaign ‘Make it Ageless’. It want older people’s voices to be heard everywhere in the world. If you want to, you can join a ‘virtual march’ to support them, from the same page, without leaving your computer.You can see the website here: The Make it Ageless campaign and signing up for the 'Virtual March'.