Abstract
INTRODUCTION: This article relates a common dilemma in professional education out of which developed a collaboration between two health disciplines at a regional Australian university. In a literature review across the two disciplines, the authors drew from social work’s teaching knowledge base in an attempt to strengthen the nursing skill base. The intention was to provide students working in the health sector with a consistent theoretical approach and practical tools when working with sexual and gender minorities.METHOD: As associate professors in social work and nursing, the authors argue on the basis of the teaching and the literature review, for an explicitly anti-oppressive approach to be applied to the education of professionals who work with elders identifying with gender and sexual minorities. Working within an anti-oppressive framework, beginning practitioners in social work and nursing in degree-level education programmes were encouraged to explore their own attitudes including taken-for-granted assumptions often unexplored in the prevailing medical models of care. How different demographics within the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer (LGBTQIA) community experience the health industry is a current issue for educators. There have been increasing challenges expressed by transgender individuals and their concerns over their specific health needs/stigma in rest-home-care facilities, for example.CONCLUSION: By embedding anti-oppressive principles in our teaching practice, relating to gender and sexual minorities, we acknowledge and open the debate to some of the possibilities/practicalities/difficulties of advocating for this within a broader multi-disciplinary in small town, rural contexts. The implications for social work and nursing education are discussed.
Highlights
This article relates a common dilemma in professional education out of which developed a collaboration between two health disciplines at a regional Australian university
A questioning of traditional professional responses to the needs of a range of client groups, including elders, those with disabilities, gay and lesbian, and mental health consumers has long been a feature of social work education, more recently fuelled by the rise of the service-user and recovery movements
Due to their training, are well-placed to provide examples of how anti-oppressive practice can apply in the care of elders self-identifying as gender and sexual minorities
Summary
By embedding anti-oppressive principles in our teaching practice, relating to gender and sexual minorities, we acknowledge and open the debate to some of the possibilities/ practicalities/difficulties of advocating for this within a broader multi-disciplinary in small town, rural contexts. Due to their training, are well-placed to provide examples of how anti-oppressive practice can apply in the care of elders self-identifying as gender and sexual minorities Both nursing and social work research needs to include the views of the LGBTQIA community, as VOLUME 29 NUMBER 2 2017 AOTEAROA NEW ZEALAND SOCIAL WORK. Social workers are encouraged in their undergraduate studies to critically reflect on their understanding of colonisation and the monocultural context of their profession They are asked to develop an understanding of their own cultural identity including such issues as ethnic background, place of birth, world view and spirituality (Bennett et al, 2013). Most recently the failure to have legislation passed to legalise gay and lesbian marriage through civil union in Australia speaks to an intolerance of difference by overriding dominant heterosexist attitudes and relationships
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