Customer Reviews

Overcoming Unintentional Racism in Counseling and Therapy: A Practitioner's Guide to Intentional Intervention (Multicultural Aspects of Counseling And Psychotherapy)

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Ridley does an excellent job of opening up issues regarding cultural competency in the mental health services professions. However, while the examples given do illustrate the problems as they currently exist, I found several of the "how to" examples of interaction rather condescending. Still, overall, the book is a great entry into just how and why the mental health field has not served our culturally-diverse populations in the past and how to better serve them in the future.

Ridley teaches that counselors should be aware of, and sensitive to, cultural or ethnic issues, when aiding their clients. In part because, at least for American counselors, the diversity of the American population is likely to cause them to have a diverse caseload.

Many ways are suggested for help counselors. One perhaps a propos method is for a counselor to herself seek counsel. This congruency or professional self awareness may be a good way for her to not later project her issues onto her clients.

In terms of client diversity, examples are given that counselors should be careful about generalising from the ethnic of a client. For example, the fact that a client is Asian might not mean that she had much in common with another Asian client. The sheer national and cultural diversity in Asia means that stereotyping can be fraught with errors.