Welcome back to Seminar!
Remainder of the Semester:
- December 11, 11:59 pm - Final Reflective Portfolio and Genogram due
- The assignment description can be found by going to the lesson plan for Week Fourteen.
We live in a country that is moderately diverse (Morin, 2013). Everyone will encounter others from different backgrounds in their places of work and throughout their career paths. While some would solely identify diversity and cultural identity through the lens of racial and ethnic backgrounds, there are a number of factors that makeup each person's cultural identity.
Privilege can be defined as a "benefit from unearned, and largely unacknowledged, advantages, even when those advantages aren’t discriminatory" (Rothman, 2014). Some would argue that by being a student of an institution of higher education and earning a degree, you are yourself privileged (Philbin, 2016; Sehgal, 2015). In truth, there are many different ways in which a person can be privileged and not even realize it (Hays, 2008).
- Read the following two articles.
Cultural Sensitivity in the Workplace
- Note: This is a portion of a book chapter that was written for people in the field of mental health. While the author uses the term "therapist" to identify the audience of the article, this could just as easily be changed to include other careers.
In a Word document, complete the ADDRESSING outline and the privilege constellation activities, and answer the following questions:
- Which factor in ADDRESSING do you believe most strongly defines your cultural identity?
- Which areas of privilege did you identify for yourself? Which were the most surprising for you? Explain.
- Where do you believe you fall on the spectrum of intercultural sensitivity? What leads you to believe this is where you are currently?
- How might your answer to the previous question affect you as a student and in the future as an employee?
References
Hays, P. A. (2008). Looking into the clinician's mirror: Cultural self-assessment. In Addressing cultural complexities in practice: Assessment, diagnosis, and therapy (2nd ed.) (pp. 41-62). Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association.
Morin, R. (2013). The most (and least) culturally diverse countries in the world. Retrieved from http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/07/18/the-most-and-least-culturally-diverse-countries-in-the-world/
Philbin, T. (2016, September 1). The tremendous unspoken privilege of a college education. StudyBreaks.com. Retrieved from https://studybreaks.com/2016/09/01/tremendous-unspoken-privilege-college-education/
Rothman, J. (2014, May 12). The origins of “privilege”. The New Yorker. Retrieved from https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-origins-of-privilege
Sehgal, P. (2015, July 14). How 'privilege' became a provocation. The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/19/magazine/how-privilege-became-a-provocation.html