Abstract
This paper describes an exploratory joint learning process with long-term welfare clients aiming to understand their identification of poverty as collective trauma. The joint learning group included twelve women living in poverty. The process included three stages: (i) addressing and thematically analysing aspects of collective trauma in the participants' life stories; (ii) comparing themes emerging from the stories with aspects of collective trauma; this led to the heuristic conceptualisation of poverty as a special type of collective trauma characterised by persistent and never-ending exposure of people living in poverty to traumatic adversities; (iii) analysing repetitive behaviour, thoughts and feelings, which are 'trauma-based behaviour', and exploring possible 'resilience-based behaviours'. Implications of the process for participants and for theory of practice and policy are discussed.
Original language | American English |
---|---|
Pages (from-to) | 1718-1735 |
Number of pages | 18 |
Journal | British Journal of Social Work |
Volume | 48 |
Issue number | 6 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 1 Sep 2018 |
Keywords
- Poverty
- collective trauma
- joint learning
- social workers
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Health(social science)
- Social Sciences (miscellaneous)