SRV Journal focus question: December 2009
The following focus question was published in the December 2009 issue of The SRV Journal. I look forward to your replies, thoughts, reflections and related questions:
The primacy of autonomy, rights and ‘choice’ is a common mindset and ideology in contemporary human services. Compare and contrast this ideology of autonomy and ‘choice’ with the principles and themes of SRV, both in terms of human service understanding and action/practice.
Which set of ideas is more likely to be supportive of interpersonal identification (SRV monograph, Wolfensberger, 1998, pp. 118-120) with a devalued person or group? Why? How?
Which set of ideas is more likely to be supportive of socially devalued people having greater access to the ‘good things of life’ (Wolfensberger, Thomas and Caruso, 1996)? Why? How?
Marc Tumeinski
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SRV Journal focus question from the June 2009 issue
In each issue of The SRV Journal, we publish a focus question, inviting our readers to individually and perhaps as part of a small study group to consider, reflect on and discuss the question. I have decided to start posting these questions just as they appeared in the Journal, starting with the first question published in the June 2009 issue and working my way up to the present issue. I will spread these posts out over the next several weeks. I invite you to post your comments, thoughts, examples and related questions. It would be particularly helpful I think to frame any replies in the context of SRV teaching and implementation.
Analyze how and to what degree interpersonal identification (SRV monograph, Wolfensberger, 1998, pp. 118-120) between service recipient and server is affected when the server is trained to use restraint techniques (physical, mechanical, chemical) and/or actually uses restraint.
Marc Tumeinski
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2 articles added to SRVIP website
We just added a PDF of 2 articles to the SRVIP website, one by Ray Lemay entitled ‘Social Role Valorization versus drug therapies’ and a second by Wolf Wolfensberger entitled ‘Reply to Levitas, McCandleless, Elenewski and Sobel.’
Below is an abstract of the Wolfensberger article:
In an article in the February 1994 issue of Mental Retardation, Wolfensberger briefly remarked on the neurotoxic, and health-and life-destroying, effects of prescription psychoactive drugs. In the October 1994 issue, Levitas et al. strongly questioned that assertion, at least as long as the drugs are not used “indiscriminately,” and questioned the publication of such controversial statements without documentation. In this article, Wolfensberger provides extensive elaboration, analysis, and documentation of his original assertion.
My thanks to Ray Lemay for permission to post his article.
Marc Tumeinski
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SRV in the News – May 18, 2012
Recently in Canada, there has been a media sensation over the release of former media baron and still-writer and columnist Conrad Black from an American prison (where he was serving time for various white-collar crimes). On May 4th, despite having renounced his citizenship in 2001, Black arrived in Canada a free man, on a 1 year temporary resident permit.
Black’s situation highlights several relevant SRV points, including; the protective capacity of one’s held or formerly held valued roles. Black is well known as a former media-mogul, corporate executive, and as mentioned is still well-known as a respected biographer and newspaper columnist. These roles, several of which he was able to retain during his prison stay, provided a defense for him against various wounds that other people in the devalued role of prisoner often endure. While other prisoners are often stripped of their valued roles while serving their sentences, Black was able to hold on to his role of writer and even continue working.
As often stated in SRV workshops and by Wolfensberger himself, money is a defense against wounding and devalued roles. Purportedly, Black flew to Canada in a private jet, pointing to the fact that he still holds a significant amount of wealth. The impoverishment of devalued people is often ignored, but as Wolfensberger has pointed out, it is often the one unifying feature of devalued people in general; whatever other devaluing condition they may have, they are also poor. Money may be the simplest way in which to help devalued persons defend themselves against further wounding.
Interestingly, it seems that while in prison, Black had time for reflection and began to identify with his fellow prisoners. He likely saw himself as being like his fellow prisoners and gained a better understanding of the injustices that they faced. In SRV terms we refer to this as “interpersonal identification”. It is often mentioned in SRV workshops that the biggest advocates of prison reform are often prominent persons who previously would not have given the issue much thought, but after spending time in prison and identifying with their fellow prisoners, are released convinced that things need to change. Black, a prominent citizen, has spent time in prison and is now actively championing prison reform.
As well, see this more recent article.
Steve Tiffany
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‘wide open’ expectations
I just read the 16 May 2012 ‘On being of service’ blog posting by Betsy Neuville entitled ‘wide open.’ It is a thoughtful reflection on the power of our (personal as well as societal) expectations of other people to then open the door to the good things of life–or to shut that door (cf. Wolfensberger, A brief introduction to SRV, 1998, pp. 105-106). Our mindsets and expectations about another person (e.g., Matthew with Down’s syndrome) or about a whole group of people (e.g., prisoners and ex-convicts) shape how we perceive and thus treat others.
As Betsy’s blog posting and some of the replies to it make clear, our expectations can be shaped by our own experiences, our physical and social environments (including the predominant values of our culture), and what we actually observe and experience (Wolfensberger, 1998, p. 35).
Much of Social Role Valorization theory addresses this reality of expectations: if we want to help societally devalued people to have greater access to the ‘good things of life,’ then one relevant and potent strategy is to work to shape the mindsets which others hold about devalued people, so that the mindsets are as positive as possible, presume the capacity for growth and development, and are consistent with the possibility that devalued people can fill socially valued roles (Wolfensberger, 1998, p. 105).
Marc Tumeinski
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The power of ideas and a leadership development mindset
“… a big thread that runs through Dr. Wolfensberger’s work is his belief in the power of ideas …”
“One big thrust of Dr. Wolfensberger’s work was the identification of promising people (especially young ones), recruiting them, and developing them … Dr. Wolfensberger truly believed the fundamental premises of the development model, as taught in SRV, about people’s capacity to grow, to meet high expectations, to do more than they were thought capable of, and he tried to put these ideas into practice.”
(The above quotes are taken from a talk given by Susan Thomas at the 2011 International SRV Conference in Australia; this talk was later published in the December 2011 issue of The SRV Journal.)
Even with his prodigious output–in writing, university teaching, workshop training, conference presentations and public lectures, study group sessions and informal conversations–Wolfensberger knew that the power of his ideas laid out in Social Role Valorization, Citizen Advocacy, the ‘moral coherency’ and the ‘sanctity of life’ workshops, needed to be shared and needed to be implemented if they were going to make a positive difference in the lives of vulnerable societally devalued people and groups. For decades, he thought deeply about how to help other people learn these ideas and put them into action. He was committed to developing other people to become teachers of these ideas, and further with developing people who could teach others how to be teachers, so that the ideas would be taught to many people in many different locations, for example, and would likely continue to be taught even after he was gone.
The various ways that his efforts continue to bear fruit are more than can be covered in a single blog post. One particular way though which I want to focus on in this post centers on an approach which Wolfensberger used around several of his longer teaching events, and which is also now being used in Australia specifically around SRV-10 leadership level workshops. Wolfensberger was deeply involved in two separate study groups based in North America, one studying his workshop on ‘how to function with personal moral coherency in a disfunctional human service world,’ and another group studying the workshop on ‘crafting a coherent stance on the sanctity of all human life.’ One of the concrete ways that Wolfensberger helped these two groups of trainers and students to deepen their understanding of the ideas taught in these respective workshops was to go through the relevant workshop material with each study group, section by section, slowly and methodically, sharing background material, stopping for questions and discussion, outlining the key ideas and connections between sections, highlighting universal principles, etc. This is a tried-and-true method of learning content with an eye toward acquiring mastery (e.g., small group with both motivation and dedication, practice, repetition, discussion, using a common set of materials, mutual feedback, etc.). Both of these groups continue to study the workshop materials in this fashion, among other related learning efforts. For example, from these two groups, some smaller local study groups have subsequently formed that are taking a similar approach to studying the material (either around ‘moral coherency’ or ‘sanctity of life’).
As mentioned above, one of Wolfensberger’s concerns was building up the capacity to conduct leadership level SRV-10 events with fully trained SRV teachers. This remains an ongoing concern in some circles in North American, Australia and New Zealand. In response to this issue, one specific and concerted effort in Australia to intensify leadership-development training opportunities for a small group of people, similar to that described above regarding the ‘moral coherency’ and ‘sanctity of life’ workshops, has been started and will have its first session of methodically going through the SRV workshop material beginning June 4, 2012. John Armstrong, a long-time SRV trainer in Australia and correspondent with the North American SRV Training, Development and Safeguarding Council, is helping to lead this effort. In an email, John shared the following with me: “We have some really keen people here, eager to take advantage of this opportunity, and we suspect there are more waiting for a crack at this.” The basic idea is to eventually hold five SRV-10 workshops over a two and a half year period. By the time members of this small group have gone through these five workshops, each trainer-candidate will have taught every SRV workshop module once. Members of the group will also be receiving and giving feedback on their teaching of the material. This effort will lay the ground work for these trainer-candidates to continue to learn and to teach SRV, and hopefully to gain even more practice, mentoring and feedback from other trainers in Australia and North America where SRV-10 workshops are regularly held. Ideally, this will be a big boost for each of the trainer-candidates specifically as well as to the larger SRV teaching movement in Australia, New Zealand and North America.
Joe Osburn, an SRV trainer and member of the North American SRV Council, is attending the first of these five workshops in Australia, as a way of offering his long-term experience and expertise with SRV training, and of building and deepening connections among those learning and teaching Wolfensberger’s ideas.
As I get updates on this effort, I will share in future posts. As I wrote above, this is just one exciting example of the fruits of Wolfensberger’s ideas and his emphasis on leadership development. My hope is that others will continue to learn from his ideas, use his ideas, develop his ideas, and also will learn from his open and generous support of developing leaders. In future posts, I will describe other ongoing leadership development efforts, such as local SRV study groups active in different locations, and the ‘trainer formation model‘ developed by the North American SRV Council.
Marc Tumeinski
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SRV in the News – May 4, 2012
A new anti-cell phone driving campaign, currently being championed by various Canadian police agencies, referred to as “hobo cops”, has inadvertently illustrated some interesting SRV concepts.
The program itself consists of undercover police officers, dressed as homeless men, who stand at roadside medians and appear to be asking for change during traffic stoppages. Upon closer inspection however, the officers are holding signs which say something to the affect of “if you are using your cell phone you will be getting a ticket”, as can be seen in the picture below.
(Photograph copyright National Post, 2012)
The first SRV issue concerns imagery in general. As is clear from the picture and the article itself, the officers are dressing themselves in ways which play into the stereotyped appearance of homeless men. In fact, in the article the officers discuss how they have attempted to dress themselves up in order to appear more authentically homeless:
“And in an apparent Canadian first in the genre, RCMP Constable Bryan Martell in Chilliwack, B.C., has been wearing a hoodie pulled up over a baseball cap with a pair of baggy, combat fatigue pants while clutching his greasy, cardboard sign written in all capital letters”.
While this stereotyping is indicative of devalued status for homeless people, it also highlights the importance of imagery in defining a role. While there are many factors that contribute to someone being in the “homeless person” role, this story makes clear that one’s appearance is an essential part of the role. Indeed, the cardboard sign has become such a ubiquitous indication that a person is in the homeless role that it is possible to predict that many motorists fail to read the signs of the approaching police officers and may not even be aware that they have been issued a ticket.
According to Wolfensberger (2009), appearance features “…act as cues that prompt observers to cast the observed person into a particular valued or devalued role” (p. 17). Here, the cues can be taken straight from the quote referenced earlier: hoodie pulled up over a baseball cap, baggy combat fatigue pants and a greasy, cardboard sign written in capital letters.
In many ways, this campaign appears to be a bizarre reversal of the concept of donning attire in order to assume a valued role. Wolfensberger refers to historical examples of people who have put on a doctor’s white coat, walked into a hospital and then were assumed by everyone present to actually be a doctor (p. 35).
Interestingly, a spokesperson from the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty objects to the police officers campaign on the grounds that it is a “deviancy-image juxtaposition” for homeless people. While the spokesperson doesn’t use those exact SRV terms, it is fairly clear from his statement that those are the grounds on which he is objecting: “We don’t want to give panhandlers a bad name by people thinking that they’re cops”.
Steve Tiffany
References:
Wolfensberger, W. (2009). Observing, recording and addressing personal physical appearance by means of the APPEAR tool. Syracuse, NY, USA: Syracuse University Training Institute for Human Service Planning, Leadership & Change Agentry; & Plantagenet, ON, Canada: l’Institut Valor Institute.
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workshop announcement: 4 day leadership level SRV workshop in West Virginia (US) in May 2012
SRV workshop 14-17 May 2012 in Charleston, WV (US).
See details and information here.
Marc Tumeinski
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article citation: The Origins of ‘Best Practices’ in the Principle of Normalization and Social Role Valorization
The Origins of “Best Practices” in the Principle of Normalization and Social Role Valorization by Guy A. Caruso and Joseph A. Osburn
Below is a link to the article citation and the journal:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1741-1130.2011.00309.x/full
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SRV theme: model coherency (# 4 in a series)
This more advanced article by Wolfensberger and Thomas published in SRV-VRS: The International SRV Journal in the spring of 1996 focuses on a particular topic concerning the SRV theme of model coherency; namely, how a model coherency analysis might be properly incorporated into a PASSING assessment. As one would expect, the authors lay out some of the potential pitfalls in this incorporation, as well as solid advice on how to do so effectively. The article also tantalizingly refers to writing and training on model coherency. Such training has not been offered for a long time. However, Wolfensberger’s last writing on model coherency we hope will be posthumously published sometime in 2013.
The article is entitled ‘The problem of trying to incorporate a model coherency analysis into a PASSING assessment.’
It lays out some of the PASS ratings and PASSING ratings most relevant to the construct of model coherency as had been formulated by Wolfensberger.
Marc Tumeinski
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