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Connecting Across Cultures
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Connecting Across Cultures
The Helper's Toolkit



August 2012 | 136 pages | SAGE Publications, Inc
Chock-full of fun exercises, surprising tips, and real-world case examples, Connecting Across Cultures: The Helper's Toolkit provides both students and professionals in health care, education, and social services with the skills to develop respectful, smooth relationships with clients and the community at large. The book offers communication tools to defuse defensive interactions, resolve conflicts constructively, and engage respectfully. Written in a warm, inviting style, the author shares her own mistakes as she explains what not to do and how to do it better. The book provides practical, hands-on strategies for connecting with people across differences related to ethnicity, religion, nationality, sexual orientation, disability, age, gender, and class. Because cross-cultural relationships involve extra challenges, this book will help you with almost every relationship you encounter.

 
Introduction
 
1. Diversity Is Unavoidable, and That's a Good Thing
 
2. The Starting Place: Knowing Who You Are
 
3. Creating a New Awareness: What You Didn't Learn in School
 
4. The Invisible Boundary: How Privilege Affects Your Work and Life
 
5. But Everyone I Know Agrees with Me: The Influence of Family and Friends
 
6. That's Not What I Mean: Effective, Respectful Communication
 
7. Say What? Why Words Matter
 
8. Making the Connection: The Four Relationship Vitals
 
9. Keeping the Connection, Even When the Signal Is Faulty
 
10. When the Golden Rule Isn't Working: Respectful Conflict Resolution
 
Conclusion

For use in MA level Social and Cultural Diversity class and doctoral level Multicultural Issues in counseling - extremely useful book for stimulating discussion and providing in-class activities to help make concepts relevant to clinical practice.

Dr Jeremy Senske
Counseling Psychology, Argosy University - Seattle
June 2, 2013

There are some very good exercises in this handy book, but it does not lend itself to be used by the entire class.

Professor Wanda Wigfall-Williams
Sch Of International Service, American University
March 15, 2013

Schedule was changed and am not teaching the course anymore.

Mrs Elizabeth Speed
Teacher Education Dept, University of Texas - El Paso
March 11, 2013
Key features

Key Features

  • Reflection questions and exercises in every chapter aid students' individual learning and can be used by instructors as classroom activities or assignments.
  • An accessible, friendly writing style minimizes defensiveness regarding hot-button issues.
  • Realistic case examples in the fields of education, human services, and health care illustrate what works and what doesn't.
  • Two full chapters address hot-button words and phrases that are offensive along with an explanation of why as well as options for alternative wording to facilitate positive interactions.
  • The author includes tips on how to recognize privilege and subtle biases that can inadvertently affect one's relationships if not properly addressed.
  • This straightforward, easy-to-learn framework considers the effects of diversity on relationships and communication.
  • Descriptions of the how-to's of communication tools include verbal and nonverbal behaviors for demonstrating respect, in-the-moment strategies for defusing defensiveness, exercises for building compassion, effective responses to stereotyping comments, and tools for working across value differences.

Sample Materials & Chapters

toc

ch 1,2


For instructors

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ISBN: 9781544302836

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ISBN: 9781452217918
$42.00

This title is also available on SAGE Knowledge, the ultimate social sciences online library. If your library doesn’t have access, ask your librarian to start a trial.