Culturally sensitive therapy? Examining the practice of cross‐cultural family therapy

Abstract

This article is drawn from a research project that examines cross‐cultural family therapy sessions in order to consider what constitutes culturally sensitive practice. A discourse analytic approach was adopted in the analysis of three sessions from two families where the family and the therapists originated from different ethnic backgrounds. This article is based around part of the research findings connected to one of the families, and focuses upon the ways in which ‘culture’ is talked about in therapy (the term ‘culture’ will be referred to in inverted commas in order to acknowledge its complexity as is emphasized in this article). This allows for an examination of the cultural assumptions that we hold as therapists, which are enacted in therapy with effects on all participants and upon the course of the therapy. The value of qualitative research methods in examining the cultural assumptions we bring to therapy is highlighted as one way of improving culturally sensitive therapeutic practice, especially with regard to therapist reflexivity.

Constructing ‘the family’ across culture

“…First, consistent with the literature (Dyche and Zayas, 1995; Falicov, 1995; Kareem and Littlewood, 1992; Krause, 1998; Pakes and Roy‐Chowdhury, 2007; Perez Foster, 1998), the findings suggest the necessity for clinicians to develop a self‐reflexive scrutiny of their own assumptions or prejudices when working interculturally. In keeping with previous work (Sinclair, 2007; Roy‐Chowdhury, 2003, 2006; Pakes and Roy‐Chowdhury, 2007) the findings point to the importance of a close study of discursive practice in helping to unpack the assumptions that clinicians bring to the consulting room.…”

“…Discourse analysis has been concerned with issues of racism (Potter and Wetherell, 1996), gender (Clumpus, 1996; Hare‐Mustin, 1994; Hollway, 1989; Wetherell and White, 1992), constructions of motherhood (Marshall, 1991) and identity (Burck 2005a, 2005b; Mama, 1995), all of which are relevant to this research question. A recent interesting example in intercultural work is Pakes and Roy‐Chowdhury's (2007) study where a discursive approach was used to interrogate the clinicians' taken‐for‐granted knowledge.…”

Sexual Dysfunction(s) in Iran: Imaginary Encounters with Otto Gross and Wilhelm Reich

“…Despite having serious misgivings about Freudian ideology, I find Kovel's heady mix of fictionalised case profiles, analysed first from a Freudian and then a Marxian perspective, fascinating. Stylistically and structurally, then, this article is indebted to The Age of Desire , although I have departed from it in three crucial aspects: first, I have shifted the investigation from the comfortable and emblematic Western couch to an Iranian landscape still exoticised by most Western scholars (see Mulholland, ; Pakes & Roy‐Chowdhury, ); second, I narrowed down mental illness to sexual dysfunction in order to make my task more manageable; and last, in lieu of Freud and Marx, I have chosen Otto Gross (1877–1920) and Wilhelm Reich (1897–1957) as therapeutic sounding boards. I hope to demonstrate how both these rather underutilised analysts can be mined for therapeutic ideas helpful to subjectivities traumatised by authoritarian states.…”

Joining revisited in family therapy: discourse analysis of cross‐cultural encounters between a therapist and an immigrant family

“…teenage culture, ethnicity, nationality, immigration history, atmosphere of the visiting town, etc.) that Aisha needed to be mindful of while visiting Pakistan (Pakes and Roy‐Chowdhury, ). Although they are in conflict possibly around how much Aisha should or shouldn't have associated with these girls while visiting Pakistan, both are constructing and engaging in conversation around the shared meaning of ‘culture’, which is illustrated in Rida's lexical agreement with Aisha in this expansion of sequences (e.g.…”