Black LGB Identities and Perceptions of Same-Sex Marriage

ABSTRACT

The 2015 SCOTUS ruling legalizing same-sex marriage was hailed as a universal victory for the lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) community, but the pervasive support mobilized to achieve this goal may mask important dissension and inequality within the community. Specifically, how race may shape or perpetuate inequalities in the LGB community through same-sex marriage largely has been absent from the discussion. Focusing on the perceived impact of same-sex marriage in respondents’ lives, I investigate the relationship between Black LGBs’ perception of same-sex marriage legalization and their intersectional identities and community membership. Drawing from the 2010 Social Justice Sexuality Project survey, I explain the complexity of the attitudes of Black LGBs to the legalization of same-sex marriage and illustrate that (1) Black LGBs exhibit heterogeneous interpretation of the effects of same-sex marriage legalization on their lives based on their racial and sexual identities, and (2) same-sex marriage may provide Black LGBs the rationale to affirm their racial community membership as sexual minorities. This study pushes our understanding of the relationship between intersectional identities and individuals’ perceptions of the self, identity-based community memberships, and social institutions.     

GENDER AND OFF-FARM EMPLOYMENT IN TWO FARMING SYSTEMS: Responses to Farm Crisis in the Cornbelt and the Mississippi Delta

An important farm household survival strategy in the 1980s agricultural crisis was off-farm employment. Recent research shows that gender role expectations structure off-farm employment's effects on farm operations. However, this research does not evaluate off-farm employment's effects within different socioeconomic and cultural settings. This article explores case studies of two localities with different farming systems: family farming in the Cornbelt and capitalist (or wage labor) farming in the Mississippi Delta. Farmers in two counties representative of each system responded to mail questionnaires covering various topics including farm and household changes made during the 1980s financial crisis. Loglinear modèls estimating the relationship between changes in off-farm employment and selected changes in farm operations derive results for the Cornbelt that confirm previous studies. Women's off-farm employment, in particular, relates to a variety of changes in the farm enterprise and improves its capital position. As expected, given its historic separation of household and enterprise, the Mississippi Delta evinces no such pattern of change. These results indicate the need for additional research on this topic, comparing different agrarian class structures.     

Disclosure of Student Status to Clients

A survey was sent to 163 MSW programs in the United States and Canada that asked directors of fieldwork to respond to questions related to their school’s policies on disclosure of student status in the field. With a response rate of 66.3% (N = 108), most of the schools (68.5%, n = 74) reported policies requiring disclosure and most directors supported this position. The authors review the ethical and legal reasons in favor of disclosure. They strongly suggest that a pro-disclosure policy be written and adopted by social work programs and the discipline’s professional organizations.     

Time and Timelessness in the Psychoanalysis of an Adult With Severe Childhood Trauma

This article is an exploration of the phenomenological experiences of temporality in the psychoanalytic treatment of a patient who suffered severe dissociation. The writer tracked exchanges with an adult analysand who repeatedly suffered childhood attachment losses and sexual and physical traumata. During treatment sessions the patient enacted dissociated alter personality states each with distinct memories. Loewald (1980) contrasted the experience of time as eternity to the fragmented temporality of trauma. Tracking his experience during key sessions, the writer/analyst infers that by repeatedly going back and forth between experiences of sequential time and timelessness, the analyst helped the patient link previously dissociated experiences. This in turn allowed the patient to realize increased coherence and stability of identity and affectivity. The case material is used to consider how multiple temporalities are represented by the patient and the implications of temporality for understanding trauma and deep dissociation.     

Organizational change: The role of climate and job satisfaction in child welfare workers' perception of readiness for change

BackgroundWhen organizations embark on deliberate efforts to increase effectiveness through organizational-level changes, those that demonstrate greater readiness for change tend to have better outcomes. In contrast, when the organization is not ready, a change effort may result in resistance, conflict and, eventually, failure. However, studies addressing how agency climate and job satisfaction influence workers' perception of the organization's readiness for change in child welfare or human service organizations are scarce.MethodsData for this study was obtained from a sample of 356 direct care and clinical child welfare workers employed at eight not-for-profit child welfare agencies under contract to provide a variety of services in a large northeastern state. Workers were surveyed on their agency's readiness for change, organizational climate, and job satisfaction. The Spector Job Satisfaction Survey measured nine subscales and Parker Organizational Climate survey measured four primary domains: role, job, supervision, and organizational dimensions. A confirmatory factor analysis was conducted on nine questions derived from the Organizational Readiness for Change survey that measured workers' perceptions of organizational readiness for change. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was utilized to determine climate and satisfaction influences on voluntary child welfare workers' readiness for change.ResultsThe results of SEM confirmed that the exogenous independent indicators of role ambiguity, supervisor goal emphasis, organizational innovation, satisfaction with communication, and the number of years in current position were predictive of workers' perception of readiness for change with significant positive coefficients.ImplicationsThis study highlights the importance of certain organizational climate and job satisfaction factors that child welfare workers' identify for the success of agency change efforts. Workers perceive that organizations may have a higher level of readiness to implement successful change initiatives when: (1) workers feel their role is clear, supervisors articulate change goals, and job performance is held to a high standard and is measurable; (2) agency leaders establish organizational communication that is explicate, and they encourage workers to develop ideas and try new ways of doing the job; and (3) the greater the number of years workers are in their current position, the more likely change initiatives are perceived to be successful. Most importantly, this study suggests that not all organizational climate or job satisfaction factors are recognized by workers as supporting change equally.     

Employers' Experiences and Views of Grow Your Own Social Work Programmes: A Qualitative Interview Study

In the light of expressed support for Grow Your Own or employer sponsored schemes for social work training, this article explores why they are not so frequently adopted. It draws on findings from a multi-method study of GYO activities and outcomes in England, in particular interviews with 27 participants from 20 organisations employing social workers and funding GYO activity. These interviews revealed that GYO was seen as a means to recruit and retain new social workers, specifically to recruit workers who were able to start practice immediately and needed minimal support, but also to widen access to the profession and to demonstrate evidence of the employers' wider commitment to its non-qualified staff by providing a career pathway. Not all those interviewed were able to provide firm data as evidence of their belief in the value of GYO schemes. The article concludes that the reasons for the decline in GYO schemes lie in the sizeable investment required to develop and sustain them. It identifies some mismatch between the need for immediate solutions to workforce shortages and the longer-term investment in students and in workforce development staff who are necessary to reap the benefits of such schemes.