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This is a case study of Transition House in Cambridge, MA, a pioneering feminist agency founded in 1976. Transition House has survived and is, today, a thriving agency. Based on interviews with and papers collected from those involved in founding and running it, as well as a few guests/clients, I argue that Transition House's evolution was impelled by three major forces shared with other early domestic violence agencies: changes in the culture due in part to successes of the battered women's movement in the early years, changes in the larger political-economic context due to national policies and economic trends, which make getting out of poverty in 2017 more difficult than it was in the 1970s, and learning from survivors and from evolving research on domestic violence. In 1976, the immediate focus was on women "battered" by their partners, and the agency was strongly identified with the women's movement. In 2017, the focus is on women who are battered by economic and social conditions as much as by their partners, and the agency is seen as a partner with the city and with other nonprofit agencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an update on issues and events related to the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) in the U.S. as of December 1986. The National Committee on Women's Issues (NCOWI), chaired by Patricia King, met twice in 1986 to discuss and outline various activities that significantly affect women. It acknowledged the accomplishment of the following noteworthy achievements in 1985 to 1986: the Institute on feminization of Poverty at the 1985 NASW Professional Symposium in Chicago; endorsement of and participation in the March 9 NOW March for Women's Lives, as well as lobbying for the Civil Rights Restoration Act on March 10; presentation of the findings of the PAF Feminist Practice Project at the NASW National Conference on Women's Issues; establishment of formal relationship with the Commission on the Role and Status of Women of the CSWE; a position statement opposing proposed antifemale revisions to DSM-III, which could result in discrimination against women; associate membership of the NASW in the National Committee on Pay Equity; the development by Barbara Shore of a position paper on research on the health of women for NIMH in which guidelines addressing gender bias in research are recommended.

The article reviews the lives of two Black women in social welfare history, Mary Church Terrell and Ida B. Wells-Barnett. For account, Mary Church Terrell and Ida B. Wells-Barnett were outstanding black women reformers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It highlights their individual contributions, as well as their styles, attitudes, beliefs, and respective views of the world. Parts of the account of Wells-Barnett were developed from her autobiography, "Crusade for Justice," edited by her daughter, Alfreda Wells Duster, and Wells-Barnett's arguments and views on lynching are expressed in her book, "A Red Record." Primary source materials on Terrell were obtained from the "Mary Church Terrell Papers," housed at the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, Howard University, Washington, DC. The lives of Wells-Barnett and Terrell have been well documented by social historians, and these two women also left a rich legacy of primary source material for content analysis and study. The extent of their contributions is best understood through historical analyses of their lives.

As a first-year doctoral student in my first quarter, I expected to be challenged, not rocked to my core. I entered the program with what I would have described as a strong, salient, and clear understanding of who I am and how I move in the world. At the end of my first year, I can say with conviction that I have more to learn. There were four critical moments that shifted/altered/jolted my learning forward. This article is structured around each of these moments and is an exploration of the themes and questions that emerged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When the name Flexner is mentioned in schools of social work, it is typically a reference to Abraham Flexner, who spoke to the National Conference on Charities and Corrections in 1915. Yet, his daughter Eleanor wrote the definitive history of the women's rights movement in the United States, and her work was influential in the transition between first- and second-wave feminism. This article honors her legacy and recognizes its significance to the integration of women's history into the social work curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although Mary Jarrett is an unfamiliar name to most social workers, she was a pioneer in the profession. Her contributions to the fields of social work, social work education, and public health exemplify the challenges of professional women in the early 20th century and illustrate the tensions between gendered and professional interests. Her writing exerted a major influence on social work thinking, while her career exemplified a breadth of practice that foreshadowed the generalist and ecosystems approaches to social work. Credited with inventing the term psychiatric social work, Jarrett articulated a broad approach to the needs of the mentally ill. An advocate for the professionalization of social work, she was one of the original founders of the Smith College School of Social Work. After Smith, Jarrett began a second career in public health. An original thinker in all professional fields, her ideas were farsighted and sound fresh today, more than 60 years after her retirement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Though the genocide in Rwanda occurred in 1994, its debilitating effects on the survivors persist, and probably will continue to persist for many years, if not generations. This paper explores the question of why a simple Western tradition may have helped a Rwandan woman to emerge from a 13-year-old state of grief. The key elements involved in her transformation were: resilience, timing, connection, and creativity. Additionally, positive regard and sincere respect can promote healing and can transcend language and culture. Parallels between self-in-relation theory and trauma recovery work are discussed. Social workers must strive to be culturally competent, but should not underestimate the effectiveness of their essential social work training and practical experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This multiphase study was designed to gain a qualitative understanding of the experiences of single-mother welfare recipients and the effect of welfare reforms on recipients' perceived ability to care for themselves and their families. The findings were drawn from the first phase of the study in which individual interviews were conducted with 39 current or former recipients, all of whom were women of color living in socioeconomically disadvantaged urban neighborhoods. Eight themes are analyzed, and the implications for social welfare policy and practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pathways of equitable access to work and residency for migrants in the United States are fraught with inconsistencies. Spouses of migrants on a specialty occupation visa (H1B) cannot obtain a social security number, and therefore, their legal standing entirely depends on their H1B spouses. Moreover, these spouses, who are predominantly women from non-Western countries, are strictly prohibited from participating in any type of income-generating activities, including self-employment. Restriction on migrant spouses' workforce participation perpetuates their involuntary financial dependency, which creates such problems as lowered self-esteem, depression, suicidality, marital problems, and domestic violence. In this article, I build on the previous works to further illuminate how the social construction, that is, a popular image or stereotypes of non-Western women as dependents and deviants might have contributed to creating and maintaining the H4 visa regulations while contemplating its long-term impact in light of the U.S. nation-building effort based on the Theory of Social Construction of Target Populations. The social construction lens offers a framework for social work scholars, educators, and practitioners to critically examine and articulate the mechanisms through which stereotypes and bias toward vulnerable populations influence policy design and thereby dictate their life choices and positioning in society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intimate partner violence (IPV) affects millions of individuals across all demographics and ethnicities. Research has revealed a direct link between experiencing IPV and having adverse physical, mental, and financial outcomes which can create difficulties for survivors. Survivors experiencing these adverse outcomes are likely to seek out support to address these issues, increasing the likelihood that they will encounter mental health professionals (MHPs). MHPs can play a significant role in assessing and addressing IPV since they are often critical access points for those experiencing violence and are likely to counsel victims. Accurate identification of current or past IPV victimization is crucial to avoiding the potential of misdiagnosis of survivors. In addition, by applying and emphasizing an understanding of the connection between individual and structural explorations of gender, race, class, and other socially constructed identities, mental health professionals can utilize the skills necessary to challenge inequalities, which in turn can encourage survivors to create strategies that make sense to themselves and their communities. This study explores what is known about how MHPs are prepared to work with IPV. Peer-reviewed journals that were published between 2005 and 2019 were reviewed systematically to develop a better understanding of the existing literature. We sought to answer the question, "What is known about how MHPs are prepared to work with IPV?" This review identified 20 articles regarding training experiences of MHPs and how these experiences shaped their responses to and practice with those experiencing IPV. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the post-incarceration housing experiences of 33 women. Using Residential Timeline Followback methodology, participants were asked to report where they lived at arrest and every location since their release. Follow-up questions asked women to describe these locations, who they lived with, how much they paid, and whether or not they felt safe. Demographic information and criminal justice history were recorded. The data paint a complicated picture of social and community resources, persistence, and struggle. Housing assets lost at incarceration were difficult to recover. Most women bounced between various locations, relying heavily on short-term subsidized congregate housing programs and rarely securing independent housing. Participants described the family, friends, and acquaintances who housed them during reentry as overextended and vulnerable. Implications for policy and practice are explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historically, Native American (NA) mothers have proven essential to the survival of their families and communities, yet scant research has examined their roles today. Current gender roles in NA communities are influenced by historical oppression (both historic and contemporary forms) that acted to reverse matrilineal gender norms in favor of patriarchy. The present study sought to explore norms and expectations for women among two NA tribes located in the southeastern region of the United States. The framework of Historical Oppression, Resilience and Transcendence (FHORT), Hill-Collins's concept of "motherwork," and a framework of reproductive justice were used to frame the study and interpret findings. This critical ethnography included data from field notes, semistructured interviews, and focus groups. Reconstructive analysis, a specific type of thematic qualitative analysis for critical ethnographies, was used to interpret data. Participants from both tribes described themes related to the expectations and roles of mothers. These expectations included themes of (a) mothers as caretakers, (b) mothers as the centers of family and role models, (c) women to prioritize family over economic and educational aspirations, and (d) decolonizing norms for mothers. While historical oppression and patriarchal norms have constrained and regulated expectations for motherhood and the domestic roles of NA women, these findings also highlight how women decolonize these norms and find ways to reclaim their power through their roles as mothers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At present, there are about 4,500 Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons and jails. This study explores Palestinian women's experiences with sexual violence by prison personnel as they visit their detained loved ones. In interviews with 20 participants, the prevalence of, type of, and reaction to sexual violence were explored. Nineteen of the 20 participants stated that they experienced some sort of unwanted verbal and nonverbal sexual comments or gestures, forced nudity, or forced touching by prison personnel. The women talked about how the experiences have harmed them as well as the strategies that they use to overcome their experiences. The findings are contextualized within international law and describe the implications of sexual violence within a culture that links modesty with religious beliefs and honor. The implications of as well as strategies to address sexual violence are discussed at micro-, mezzo, and macro level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An editorial is presented on the Anjanette Young who was getting ready to launch her new business in her native Chicago, mentoring social workers to complete their licensure exam. The article discusses that Anjanette, who has two master's degrees, one in human services and one in social work from the Jane Addams School of Social Work at the University of Illinois Chicago, was just doing the lighting the passions of young people and coaching them to be of service to other.

Limited research has utilized public abortion narratives to understand how individuals process through their abortion experiences. To address this gap in the literature, this study used thematic analysis to consider the public abortion stories of 39 participants from the Tennessee Stories Project, focusing on how individuals process through these experiences and the context of the abortion experience in a person's life course. Participants were primarily those who were abortion patients; however, abortion providers and supporters including partners or spouses, family members, and friends of those who received abortion care were also represented. Data analysis indicated that abortion seekers engage in introspection, involving political and religious/spiritual considerations; report specific feelings about their abortion experience, including having no regrets and feeling gratitude; process emotions related to the abortion experience by normalizing emotional responses and using mementos; and position their abortion in the context of their life, both in terms of their family and career opportunities and personal development. These findings provide valuable insight into how individuals process through the abortion experience, before, during, and after the abortion procedure, and suggest possible directions for service providers, advocates, and policy makers in order to better support abortion patients, providers, and family members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As one of the world's most vulnerable populations, women with disabilities are frequent victims of physical, emotional, sexual, and financial abuse. Indeed, they experience abuse at higher rates than women and men who do not have disabilities and men with disabilities. They are also more likely to experience intimate partner violence (IPV) than any other adult group. Yet there is not one psychosocial intervention tailored to the needs of women with disabilities who have experienced IPV that facilitates their recovery from complex trauma. This is largely the result of limited (albeit growing) research on the risk factors for IPV, barriers to leaving abusive relationships, and trauma-related issues that women with disabilities face, especially among racialized women with disabilities, 2SLGBTQ+ women and gender nonconforming persons with disabilities, older/aging women with disabilities, and other subgroups. In order to develop the most culturally competent, effective interventions and policies to address the prevalence of IPV among women with disabilities, an approach that is informed by a combination of critical disability theory, feminist disability theory, and complex trauma theory is recommended. IPV among women with disabilities is a global injustice; therefore, this concern is highly relevant to the field of social work and its mission to advance social justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research conducted at the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work assessed the feminist behavior and identification of two samples of MSW students using the Feminist Behavior Scale, which was developed specifically for the study. The students' responses indicated that they had little awareness of feminist issues and did not identify themselves as feminists. The study also found that the MSW curriculum does not focus on the psychology, history, or oppression of women and that MSW students have few opportunities to write papers that reflect feminist issues. The implications of these findings for a profession that is dominated by women and that frequently provides treatment and other services to women and their families are discussed.
The finding that social work students in a major university are neither aware of nor involved in feminism should be distressing to feminist educators. Women continue to be overrepresented in social work, which offers both a career and a professional identity for them. Yet the results of this study suggest that students are neither being exposed to feminist ideology in their course work nor discussing the special significance of becoming professional women. Although the students reported discussing equal rights in their personal lives, they did not indicate that their course work allowed them the opportunity to incorporate a concern for equal rights into clinical practice, research, or policy. That is, they were not being taught to view social programs or mental health within a context sensitive to the societal position of women and were not informed by a feminist analysis of social, economic, and political inequality. Certainly, these results, if substantiated in future research, would be a cause for concern of educators who are committed to the incorporation of feminist perspectives into the social work curricula.
Future researchers of social work education might wish to use the FBS to evaluate MSW curricula with... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on the results of a study, which examined the challenges faced by 47 South Asian women in settling in Canada. South Asian immigrant women are from a variety of ethnic, cultural, and linguistic backgrounds. Factors like race-ethnicity time of immigration, age, and immigration class serve to define immigrant women's status in Canada pointed out that an examination of the history of Canada indicates that class cannot be understood without reference to class relations. Integrative antiracism is a suitable framework for understanding the post-immigration experiences of South Asian women who confront the reality of their immigrant status living in Canada. Women who phoned to participate in the study were briefly interviewed to assess whether they met the study criteria. In conclusion, South Asian women's experiences in Canada are best understood when they are examined from a framework in which race-ethnicity class, and gender are inextricably intertwined. It is important to consider that race-ethnicity, gender, and class are social constructions and that these women's experiences are unique because they are negotiated within the main-stream Canadian culture and institutions.

This article describes the life and work of Nannie Helen Burroughs, a Black activist leader during the progressive Era of the early 20th century. Burroughs was a member of the women's movement within the National Baptist Convention, which was the largest organization of Blacks in the United States. An educator, political activist, club woman, and religious leader, she is considered by many to have been an organizational genius. Burroughs was a charismatic woman who believed in the ideology of self-help and encouraged Blacks to establish and support the growth of their own educational institutions. In letters dating from the early 1930's, Burroughs began a cooperative agreement with Lawrence and other women of the Woman's Missionary Union to bring White and Black Baptist women together, independent of their respective male-dominated conventions. The article emphasizes that women can use Burroughs's work as a model for improving the conditions of poor people and minority groups. According to the author, Burroughs was a notable reformer. There are many women in the Black community who have the potential to emulate and even exceed her contributions. By studying her life and her accomplishments, they, too, can learn to promote progressive social change.

This article explores the contribution of female social workers during the second generation of the profession, from about 1920 to 1955. This article also presents an account of two prominent women of the time, Helen Hall and Harriett M. Bartlett. These two women are highlighted because they were prominent in two major areas of social work in this period-settlements and medical social work, little has been written about their contributions in this period, and there is a rich resource of primary data on both. The second generation of social work was an exciting, vibrant period in the profession's history during which women played a significant role in carrying the profession forward toward its unification in National Association of Social Workers. During this period, a social environment that encouraged the profession's dominance by men affected social work, like other professions. Yet women held leadership roles in all areas of social work and continued to dominate in some areas throughout the generation. Two of the period's leaders, Hall and Bartlett, were giants in their fields, original thinkers and architects of the future.

This article, written by two Indigenous female identifying social work practitioners, academics, and researchers with lived experience of violence, is based on a preliminary research project with survivors of trafficking and those who offer them support services. It includes the voices of women, two-spirit, and trans women who have been trafficked, tackle the issues of the current impacts of colonization and structural racism as the root of gender-based violence, and offer pathways forward at the grassroots and systemic levels. The authors also argue that research into gender-based violence toward Indigenous women, girls, two-spirit, and trans women be controlled and owned by Indigenous peoples and communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores how experiences of intimate partner violence (IPV) combined with immigration-related stress shaped pregnancy and postnatal experiences among two immigrant women in the U.S.-Mexico border region of El Paso, TX. Enactment of U.S. immigration policies was changing rapidly during the period of data collection (2018–2019), generating a heightened sense of immigration-related insecurities for research participants. This context brought attention to how immigration law can exacerbate the potential for adverse health outcomes for pregnant and postnatal women caught in abusive relationships. This article presents the case studies of two women, Sara and Sofi, whose experiences reflected broader patterns documented in a larger qualitative study of the emotional experience of pregnancy among 35 first- and second-generation immigrant women in the U.S.-Mexico border region. Both women's narratives highlight the ways U.S. immigration laws led to a sense of entrapment in abusive relationships during their pregnancies, which put them at heightened vulnerability. Further, the stress they experienced had the potential to lead to embodied health vulnerabilities. The case studies presented illustrate the ways the law can fuel processes that contribute to health risks, highlighting how U.S. immigration law can function as legal violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is a critical feminist study focusing on illustrating how college students who identify as Latinx and women perceive barriers to help-seeking should they experience sexual violence. With this study, we address a gap in the research on help-seeking after sexual assault. The majority of research on this topic focuses on the experiences of European American women and is based on survey data. This study focuses on the perceptions and experiences of Latinx women attending a large, state institution. For data collection, we conducted focus groups and individual interviews. We used grounded theory methods for the data analysis, which resulted in the emergence of one primary category, avoiding shame, and two subcategories (prioritizing the family and prizing virginity). The findings from this study demonstrate how the study participants view prioritizing the family and prizing virginity as barriers to seeking help for sexual assault. These barriers protect the women and their families from experiencing shame. We conclude the article with practice and research implications grounded in the results of this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article will bring together the social glue concept of social reproduction and a feminist analysis of civil society to the study of nonprofit care work in order to cast analytic light on the dynamics of care work in the nonprofit sector and contribute to theorizing care work, to identify and theorize aspects of nonprofit care work which reproduce and sustain social glue, and to supplement theory on civil society. Drawing on qualitative interviews with nonprofit care workers in South Africa and Scotland, this article argues that care work, in general, and nonprofit care work, more specifically, are key components of civil society and central to the gendered social glue that holds societies together. We argue that nonprofit care workers are part a distinctive but porous set of social relations and have their own unique way of sustaining social bonds in the context of late neoliberalism. The article looks closely at three dynamics of social glue in nonprofit care work, namely, empowerment, emotional/personal costs, and unpaid work. We argue that nonprofit care workers find micro ways of resisting the erosion of social glue and reweaving the social fabric through care and relationship and further that these forms of resistance may sustain much needed social bonds until larger social transformation is possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author reflects on her retirement as editor-in-chief of "Affilia." She says that the journal has made a significant difference from the days when social work journals just did not publish on issues about women. It makes her feel both proud and pleased that two competent women will be shepherding the journal.

Addressing mass incarceration through smart decarceration initiatives is one of the Grand Challenges for Social Work named by the American Academy of Social Work Welfare and Research. The exponential growth of the U.S. prison system is largely due to legislation that targets marginalized communities, including people of color, poor people, people with mental illness, and those living with disabilities, as well as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) people of all ages. In this article, we seek to complicate the current conversation on smart decarceration by arguing that social workers committed to addressing mass incarceration should engage abolitionist theory, politics, and organizing in their work in order to effectively address the root causes driving the buildup of the prison nation. We engage feminist and queer theories as two theoretical interventions that can guide this work. We next describe how LGBTQ+ youth enter the criminal legal system, highlighting how normative systems of gender and sexuality subject LGBTQ+ youth to punitive policing, surveillance, and discipline. Finally, we share three models of prison abolitionist organizing led by LGBTQ+ people of color as case studies. By examining how these organizations embrace queer and feminist abolitionist frameworks, we identify concrete ways that social workers can adopt abolitionist principles and practices in their work to address mass incarceration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

History reveals that the pathway toward carceral feminism was fraught with contradictions. Feminist reform strategies that appeared progressive devolved into mandates contributing to the policies of mass incarceration; frameworks meant to disavow racist myths of violence inherent to communities of color fueled color-blind narratives that cloaked white, middle-class-defined social movement priorities; safety strategies protecting survivors of violence entrapped them into set options violating the right to self-determination. Today's account of carceral feminism reveals well-intentioned choices leading to often ill-fated outcomes. As the critique of carceral feminism seeps into the discourse of the feminist anti-violence movement, a shift toward new values, policies, and practices holds the possibility of radical new directions. However, there is no reason to assume that this new pathway will be so straightforward. This article centers the dynamic of contradiction to synthesize insights of post-Marxist thought in application to contemporary anti-carceral feminist trends represented by transformative justice options. It also reflects on the recent ascendance of restorative justice and a renewed potential for carceral co-optation. The aim is to illuminate troubled areas of revision and radical alternatives and better navigate inevitable ethical and pragmatic tensions that may define future social movement trajectories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the United States, between 1907 and 1978, the proliferation of eugenic state practices routinely targeted institutionalized women with legalized involuntary sterilization. Sterilization laws and policies were a form of reproductive control, which predominantly impacted women from marginalized communities. After the implementation of federal regulations prohibiting involuntary sterilization practices, state agencies continued to engage in coercive sterilization under the guise of "voluntariness." Using a reproductive justice framework, we introduce a concept of reproductive control embedded within the carceral state. Tracing historical sterilization practices and examining the use of long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARC), we argue that LARC represents a different form of involuntary sterilization. The emergence of LARC as a highly effective, nonagentive, and mediated form of contraception for vulnerable populations demands interrogation. We identify the use of LARC as soft sterilization, which is both related to and distinct from other forms of reproductive control. As such, reproductive autonomy is not possible without the destruction of the carceral state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Programs and policies addressing gendered violence in impoverished rural areas in developing countries face a number of challenges: high rates of intimate partner violence, low reporting rates, cultural restrictions on women's employment, lack of education and adequate health care, limited access to legal options and social services, and corruption in the criminal justice system. In these social contexts, anonymity is low and patriarchal notions of gender are especially persistent. In some areas, there are no services specifically for victims of gendered violence and shelters are in urban centers, far away from family and friends. Even where legal interventions are available, the outcomes often favor the perpetrators, making this option less attractive and in some cases dangerous. Because of these barriers, victims of intimate partner violence in rural settings rely more often on informal or community networks of support rather than formal authorities and legal sanctions to stop the violence. Consequently, addressing intimate partner violence in rural areas in developing countries requires more than a criminal justice response; it requires empowering rural women economically and socially. This conceptual article describes one program that attempts to empower rural women and the implications for creating safe space for victims of violence in challenging contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores women's experiences of the women's safety services associated with a South Australian integrated program for male perpetrators of domestic and family violence. As small scale and exploratory, the study aimed to understand impact of such services on women's perceptions of safety. Interviews were conducted by telephone, using a semi-structured format, with 14 women whose partners or ex-partners had been referred to a perpetrator intervention program. Informed by a feminist standpoint perspective, thematic analysis was used to explore each woman's experience and perception of safety. The findings of the study suggest that integrated domestic and family violence programs can improve women's feelings of safety through the application of practical safety planning, timely intervention, emotional support, and trauma-focused practice. Importantly, while the behaviors and actions of perpetrators were clearly relevant to women's perceived safety, it was apparent that focusing on women's strengths and capacity for recovery can significantly impact on their continued sense of safety and well-being. This article also reiterates the importance of women's perspectives in evaluating the effectiveness of perpetrator interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article conceptualizes how place-based analysis can generate innovative understandings of sex work and spatial justice, including ways in which stigma, well-being, and marginality are embodied in sex work places. Focusing on three interconnected dimensions of place—geographic location, material environment, and sociopower structures—this article examines the unexplored realm of place and sex work. Beginning with an analysis of existing sex work literature and knowledge relating to dimensions of place, we explicate the role of feminist ideologies, juridical contexts, and the built environment as the conceptual and analytic groundwork for a place-based understanding of sex work. Architectural spatial methods then generate a place-based analysis of two case study exemplars: the Residence in Western Canada and the Strichtplatz in Zurich, Switzerland. We conclude by considering avenues to incorporate place theory into sex work research and the social work discipline, ultimately advocating for research, policy, and practice that concomitantly address sex workers' social and spatial oppression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses feminist critical analysis as a conceptual framework in order to reflect upon the carceral drifts adopted by gender equality policies in Spain. This issue has been deeply analyzed in the American context, and we believe it is relevant to bring the experiences of other contexts into discussion, such the Spanish one, where the welfare state has been affected by the 2008 global financial crisis. With the aim of adding to the discussion and making a contribution from feminisms and social work perspectives, this work carries out a comparative analysis on carceral policies addressed to women, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, on protection policies for women victims of gender-based violence. Based on our fieldwork in Andalucia (Spain) for more than 10 years, as well as on legal and programmatical text analysis, we question the alleged control/protection separation, highlighting the existence of gendered carceral logics in both contexts. We highlight the social control to which women are subject and for which subjects women to the image of a "good victim" on the one hand and a "good mother" on the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including the close ties between the carceral state and the social welfare state; social workers position at the nexus of both care and control; and Spain's domestic violence services and the carceral system.

This article examines the intersections of the child protection, immigration and criminal systems, and the carceral logics that undergird all three systems. Taking seriously Patricia Hill Collins' (2017) call to analyze "intensified points of convergence" (p. 1464), we analyze the role of social work in perpetuating carceral systems and the tools that feminist social work provides for disrupting them. Using a case analysis of a foster child in Halifax, Canada, who in 2018 was faced with deportation after social workers failed to secure his citizenship status, we argue that a pipeline exists between child protection and a growing "crimmigration" system. The carceral logics of this pipeline not only draw from anti-Black, Islamophobic, and settler colonial histories of oppression, but they also position certain noncitizen families as unassimilable and requiring of state intervention rather than social supports. With this carceral pipeline in mind, we then draw from feminist anticarceral and intersectional approaches to consider a range of resistance strategies. Ultimately, we argue for a transformative justice approach that goes beyond reforming the pipeline and instead takes seriously the insights of abolitionist movements as an alternative to purely reformist approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For criminalized people, particularly those who have been recently incarcerated, applying for and maintaining public assistance—cash aid and/or food assistance—is an immediate and crucial element of survival. Yet relative to a substantial body of research that documents pathways into and out of carceral citizenship, this aspect of postincarceration work has received little scholarly attention. Likewise, frontline welfare workers are often simplistically portrayed as gatekeepers who restrict poor people's access to public assistance. In this article, we make visible the intersection of welfare and criminal-legal involvement by examining how criminalized clients are understood by welfare workers in one large, densely populated California county. Our data come from a larger ethnographic study of women's postincarceration experiences of public institutions and include in-depth interviews with 19 frontline welfare workers and participant observation of welfare offices. We find that (a) criminal-legal awareness varies among welfare workers; (b) workers engage in substantial invisible labor, in large part to counteract the carceral logics of the welfare system; and (c) in absence of professional training, workers draw heavily on their own situated knowledge to manage the challenges of their work. Contextualizing these findings within a broader trend toward the deprofessionalization of welfare workers, we argue that the training and education of this workforce, particularly around criminal-legal issues, is an important avenue for social work advocacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With millions of women experiencing forced displacement, attention is needed toward migrant women's lived experiences. Religion is an understudied but central component of coping for many migrant women. Through the use of qualitative and quantitative methods, an exploratory study was conducted with 36 forced migrant Shia Muslim women residing in a predominantly Sunni Muslim country of first asylum. Using the brief Multidimensional Measure of Religiousness/Spirituality and drawing from feminist theory, intersectionality, and the ecological framework, we describe women's experience with religion and spirituality across a variety of domains. Open-ended semistructured interviews were analyzed using a thematic analysis approach. Participants were highly religious across all domains measured. Key themes emerged related to how religion helps women manage stress, including: (1) trusting God to solve problems and (2) relying on prayer and other religious practices to cope. Despite these strengths, women also described major challenges to religious practice, where the third identified theme emphasized that fear and persecution limit religious practice. This article builds understanding of forced migrant women's experiences, with implications for social work practice and immigration policy. Service organizations can recognize and support religious coping, particularly among religious minority refugee women. Additionally, practitioners and policy makers can promote religious tolerance and understanding within diverse host communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]