SOCIAL WORK IN SOCIETY

QUESTION

SOCIAL WORK

Unit-Anti-discriminatory &Anti-oppressive practices in work experience

Deadline-13/04/2012

2500-words

Harvard reference

Make sure the work is in three different sections

Section –A

Using the case studies  below as examples

1. Describe any problems that are evident.
2. State whether any instances are oppressive, discriminatory or both.
3. Explain why.

Form a conclusion which defines both oppression & discrimination. With reference to the case studies find the examples of oppression & discrimination ensure you

1. Define oppression and discrimination
2. Highlight instances of oppressive and discriminatory practice
3. Justify why the case study shows oppression and or discrimination

Case study 1

Afsaal Khan is a73 yr old retired bus driver, living alone in a terraced house in a predominantly white, working class area of Bury. Mr Khan receives meals –on –wheel everyday to ensure he had enough to eat. Social services have introduced a new policy which states that everyone over the age of 70yrs will receive meals on wheels, but to save the cost there will a fixed menu with no alternative available.

Case study 2

Tina Newton is a 37year old physically disabled woman who uses a wheelchair. Tina has to make regular trips to the college as a part of a degree course. She relies on a social service funded company to transport her to and from college. The cost is based per individual at £3.50 per day, but Social services policy states that due to where Tina lives and that the driver has to use specialised equipment to help her, means the cost has increased to £5.89 a day.

Case study 3

Jack is a 9 year old black male with a learning disability. Jack is currently living in a supported housing unit for the children. As the unit is above the capacity social services are placing Jack with a white family in a local area.

Case study 4

George is a three year old and attends a local nursery whilst his parents are out working. He enjoys playing with a wide variety of toys. Whilst playing with a doll, he is interrupted by a nursery nurse who says ‘’Boys don’t play with dolls, why don’t you play with an action man instead?’’

Case study 5

Georgina is a black, 34 year old woman whose partner has become violent towards her. She now lives in a hostel with three year old daughter. Social services have appointed Mark, a new social worker. He is white middle class and has no experience with domestic violence.

Section 2

Using the below case study as an example of discrimination

1. Define and identify four types of discrimination
2. Provide a written reflection using De Bono’s thinking hatsusing Aisha case

 Aisha Case study

Aisha Yusuf, a black lady arrived to England as a refugee, she was born in Somali and bled in Kenya. Due to her accent and poor English; she was allocated different interpreters to accompany her, for any official matter relating to her case with the lawyer, home office staff, dentist, hospital and housing. She was dispersed from Liverpool to Bury, when she was eight months pregnant.

She didn’t know the area/anybody, no family and was housed alone in a white community area with no support worker to assist her to integrate with the community or know her rights hence, socially isolated.

When Aisha’s baby was overdue two weeks, she was admitted to the hospital; was briefed by the nurse through the interpreter about the induction procedure, and also administered the first of the four tablets. The next nurse on duty failed to administer the second tablet but, Aisha reminded her. The nurse claimed she couldn’t understand her accent and didn’t ring an interpreter either. She had no mobile phone to ring her friends back in Liverpool, and was afraid to speak to talk to the nurse again; although she understood simple sentence. The third tablet was to begin as soon as the doctor had assessed her. For a week a student nurse monitored her blood pressure and baby’s heart beat each morning , but no nurse attended her, Aisha  approached the nurses for pain relief tablet a couple of times, but they didn’t give her any, instead, they showed her a warm bath to help her relax. The same week she wasn’t seen by the doctor, the nurses drew the curtain around her bed  each morning during the doctors round and told the doctors that she didn’t speak English and  waiting for an interpreter which they failed to contact.

Aisha packed her case went to the nurse’s station very upset feeling neglected and decided to discharge herself from the hospital. Nurse rang up the interpreter and highlighted to her the risks of being alone at home because of her condition; Aisha complained that, she had not been seen by any doctor/nurse and that; she would call an ambulance at the telephone booth next to her house if she went into labour.

Immediately an interpreter arrived in the ward and was also seen by the doctor who, decided she has an emergency Caesarean section on the same day. During her second week in the ward, she was left unattended till night shift but she was glad that her baby was a life.

After one year she joined a local college to improve her English and pursue a qualification and a career in Social work.

Section c

Using various media sources(IN UNITED KINGDOM)) give TWO examples to define the following terms and highlight characteristics for each – the media sources  must be different for each term

• Race
• Disability
• Stereotypes
• Discrimination
• Prejudice

SOLUTION

Section B

1. Define and identify four types of discrimination

Discrimination in its most basic forms is the individual or sequential occurrences of differentiating humans into different categories and treating them different. It can be of positive and negative nature. The negative discrimination comes along with the discrimination along with the negative behavior or attitude which is a result of the discrimination.

(Toshihiro, 2009) The discrimination happens in a pattern and individuals or groups are being discriminated on the basis off several factors which includes class (lower, middle, or upper class), gender (male or female), age (if there is a person of older age he is being treated differently in some situations), disability (for example physically handicapped people), and people with different sexual orientations (gays or lesbians for example).

Discrimination and oppression are very closely related to each other. Sometimes it is seen that oppression is a subset or a part of discrimination. When there is a discrimination, the resultant of is some actions which are seen to be in the form of oppression. Thus oppression though it can be seen to be part of discrimination yet sometimes even without being discriminated people is seen to be oppressed.

Hence it is imperative to understand what oppression before going ahead is and describing the different types of discrimination. Oppression in its most basic form is exercising power and authority in a manner which is not appropriate and is unjust. (Thompson, 2001a, p. 34) Oppression is basically the degrading treatment of the individuals or groups which is done either by any other individual, group, party, or the government. Thus in the most atomic way it is clear that the oppressions brings humiliation and this is an action which is a clear indication of the fact that the rights are not equal and that the citizenship of the people or groups that are being oppressed are not taken into serious consideration.

The types of discrimination falls under two basic categories, namely, direct and indirect discrimination.

In detail there are four different types of discriminatory actions:

1. Intentional Discrimination
2. Subtle Discrimination
3. Statistical Profiling
4. Discriminatory practices which is entailed in the organizational culture.

2. Provide a written reflection using De Bono’s thinking hats using Aisha case

De Bono’s thinking hats is the best process to critically analyze any given case or question or a particular situation so that the analysis is unbiased and is perfect in nature because when humans critically analyze the situation they tend to get the emotional factor and hence the entire analysis does not pen down perfectly. According to De Bono’s thinking hats method there are six different colored hats – White, Red, Black, Yellow, Green, and Blue.

Each hat has its own significance and is associated with the different factor. Each hat is worn one at a time. When one wears the white imaginary hat he seeks for information, facts, and figures. Wearing the red hat means the thinker uses his gut feeling and passion, black hat means that the thinker is judgemental, yellow means the thinker lists down all the benefits about the situation, (Debono, 1990) green means the thinker thinks differently, blue signifies that the thinker summarizes the findings that he has found so far in the analysis of the situation. Each time the thinker is allowed only to wear one hat at a time and he thinks according to the color of the hat and its designated nature. But in many cases the hats overlap and there are two hats which are in continuous use.

The hats are nothing but the thinking mode that one uses, one need not to put stress on himself on switching on and off the hats while thinking and analyzing situations, but he should take care of using each of the perspectives which is attached with the hats (deBono, 1985). The role playing makes sure that the thinker is unbiased and is not letting his ego to come in between while making analysis or decisions. This is an excellent means to take decisions as with each of the hats the thinker gets a very different perspective and he slowly reaches to the core by analyzing different layers of colors. (Walter, J. C., 1995) Once the thinker has analyzed all the perspectives he is in a better position to take the decision by choosing the best amongst all of the alternatives.

(NHS, 2008) Thus in this process can think critically by the use of the hats and figures out the various alternatives and then takes the best decision.

In this particular case study of Aisha, Aisha is a black lady who was allocated interpreter to accompany her so that it becomes easy for her to manage the legal issues and other matters where English was required. She was discriminated and was forced to house in a white community area without any aid or assistance though she did not know anybody or any areas. Such a social isolation is a clear case of oppressing and here rights were not being considered. As she was pregnant she was admitted to the hospital and was given four tablets by the nurse. She was neglected in the hospital and this is seen when the nurse did not give her the second tablet on time and Aisha had to remind her.

Though the nurse said that she did not understand Aisha’s accent and hence she did not give the second tablet, yet she did not take the help of the interpreter when she was very sure that she was not able to understand Aisha’s accent. The patient here was so left out that she feared even to speak to the nurse and she did not have any medium of communication like mobile phone so that she could take the help of her friends in Liverpool.

This is such a case of intense discrimination that the even after the beginning of the third tablet the doctor had started to assess her and the baby. The doctor monitored the pressure and the heart beat, but there was no nurse who was designated to attend to the patient. The patient herself approached the nurse of the hospital and depicted her pain but the nurse just showed her that warm batch could help and left Aisha helpless.

The matters became worse day by day and the negligence increased to such an extent that even the doctors stopped seeing and examining her and the nurses drew curtain around her bed. There was no one who could help her and she was left helpless without an interpreter. The staff shed their responsibility from her saying that as she did not speak English they cannot help her in any case and that they are trying to contact the interpreter but they are failing to contact him. In this entire situation it is very evident that she was being absolutely neglected and that everyone was trying to oppress her because of the reason of color and because she was a refugee.

Finally Aisha lost her patience and she decided to get discharged from the hospital because she was being discriminated and oppressed at the same time and that there was nobody who was willing to help her in a situation where they should be with her and take immense care of her. When Aisha had already decided to get discharged then the nurse contacted the interpreter and said about the risk of being alone in such a situation. The nurse could have done the same earlier but she did not. This shows the negligence and discrimination that the hospital authorities have shown towards her. She was denied of the human rights and was not at all being given the proper treatment even as a human being. On this scenario Aisha got so impatient and frustrated that she said she would manage and would call the ambulance when the pain happens and she also complained that when she was in the hospital these were the same authorities who did not take care of her and had discriminated and had ignored her to the core.

When Aisha became so defensive then she saw that the interpreter arrived immediately and that the doctor same in with the advice that she had to be operated the same day. Even after all this she was not attended by any of the hospital authorities in the second week but she was finally glad that at least her baby came in to existence in this world. Post going through all these rough circumstances she finally joined college and decided that she will learn English so that she does not have to undergo similar situation of negligence and discrimination anytime in her future and she also decided to take up Social studies as her subject for further studies.

Reference:

De Bono, E., 1985,  Six thinking hats,  Boston: Little, Brown and Company.

De Bono, E., 1990,  I am right – you are wrong .  From this to the New Renaissance: from Rock Logic to Water Logic.  London: Penguin Books

NHS, 2008, Six Thinking Hats, Viewed on 12^th April 2012, http://www.institute.nhs.uk/quality_and_service_improvement_tools/quality_and_service_improvement_tools/creativity_tools_-_6_thinking_hats.html

Toshihiro, H., 2009, Prohibitions of discrimination and three types of Discrimination identified in the convention on the rights of persons with disabilities, viewed on 12^th April 2012, http://www.unescap.org/esid/psis/meetings/EGM_CRP_2009/ProhibitionsOfDiscrimination.pdf

Walter, J. C., 1995, Six Thinking Hats: Argumentativeness and Response to Thinking Model, viewed on 12^th April 2012, http://www.waltercarl.neu.edu/PDFs/ritseniorthesis.pdf

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