Abstract
Social workers are increasingly required to engage service users of every race, language, creed, and culture in plural settings throughout their life cycle from cradle to the grave. Canada’s liberalized immigration policies and multicultural stance makes it a popular destination for people of diverse, multiple and intersecting identities. Social work educators must therefore not just teach, but sensitize future social workers to the diverse realities of all Canadians including Indigenous, European and racialized settlers in Canada’s ever evolving social milieu. Against this backdrop, I designed an anti-Black racism course to address an identified gap in the graduate studies curriculum of a Canadian university’s social work program. In this paper, I reflect on my experience of engaging diverse learners. The classroom comprised Black, Indigenous, people of colour and white students. I reflect on the course design process, modes of engagement and the assignments utilized to promote reflection, self awareness and application of concepts and theories in the field among this learners. The dialogues, tensions, denials, defenses, ultimate healing that occurred in this unique classroom are reflected upon and the insights gained are shared. This paper contributes to the body of knowledge on the scholarship of teaching and learning anti-Black racism to diverse learners. Black educators teaching tough taboo topics such as racism will gain insights into pedagogical and relational processes for teaching.
Presenters
Olufunke ObaAssociate Professor, Social Work, Toronto Metropolitan University, Ontario, Canada
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
Learner Diversity and Identities
KEYWORDS
Intercultural Learning, Social Work, Anti-Black Racism, Black Educator, Canada
