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Field training in the Global South and unequal power relations: On the challenges of encounters
Mid Sweden University, Faculty of Human Sciences, Department of Social Work, Östersund, Sweden.ORCID iD: 0000-0003-0810-2848
Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway.
2018 (English)In: FORSA/NOUSA - Nordic Social Work Conference 2018: Book of Abstracts, 2018, p. 41-41Conference paper, Oral presentation with published abstract (Refereed)
Abstract [en]

International field training offers unique opportunity for social work students to deepen their understandings of dominant social forces and power relations behind the reproduction of inequalities. Field training in the Global South is often influenced by many students’ colonial discourses and ignorance of their ‘whiteness of power’ received through their West-centric education in the Global North. This creates a challenge for social work educators to properly prepare students for field training in Global South. In this study, based on a mixed method approach, web survey, focus groups and document review of field reports, we examine how international field training influence Swedish and Norwegian students’ knowledge and personal and professional development. The study is guided by the questions: ‘What exemplify inequality of power encountered by the students conducting field training in the Global South?’, ‘What prevent and enable students in identifying unequal power relations during international field training?’, ‘How can social work educators ensure that social work students disentangle power dynamics at personal and structural levels? The results of the study show that international field training can both contribute to deepening students’ understanding of power and privileges and also reinforce their a priori ‘Us’ and ‘Them’-based knowledge. This means that social work educators bear a major responsibility for developing critical curriculums including pedagogical practices using critical reflection of how own biases, assumptions and dominant worldviews may affect the ways students perceive differences and power relations in international field trainings in the Global South.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2018. p. 41-41
National Category
Social Work
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:oru:diva-72397OAI: oai:DiVA.org:oru-72397DiVA, id: diva2:1287943
Conference
FORSA/NOUSA - Nordic Social Work Conference 2018: Power and Social Work, Helsinki, Finland, November 21-23, 2018
Available from: 2019-02-12 Created: 2019-02-12 Last updated: 2023-04-03Bibliographically approved

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Jönsson, Jessica H.

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CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

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Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf