Saturday, July 18, 2009

Child Abuse and Culture: Working with Diverse Families Review


I have been a forensic interviewer at a Children's Advocacy Center for 9 years now. I train in the area of Forensic interviewing and specifically Diversity. I cannot say enough about the importance of Ms. Fonte's work here. From the perspective of a CAC Forensic Interviewer she is speaking directly to me and my needs in the field with this work.

CAC Executive Directors will find this book invaluable for the Standard Criteria regarding Agency Cultural Competancy. The Standard itself is addressed directly in one full chapter. If you have read this book when your review comes around and worked with it in relation to your Agency, in my humble opinon you will be on the cutting edge of the available thought and practice of Cultural Competancy at your Center. You will get it even if you can't implement it in your area just yet. This is your primer, and a MUST READ for Agency Cultural Competancy.

Ms. Fontes does talk specifically about Puerto Rican and Latino cultures in this volume more so than others, but do not discredit any part of the book for that. There are FAR reaching concepts and a paridigum shift talked about in the introduction by Jon Contes as going beyond Cultural sensitivity into more of an action and result based competency. And the book lives up to that at minimum as a GREAT PLACE TO START.

This book should become a Standard Classic in our field along side of others like Lamb and Poole's book on interviewing from the 90s, and Shame on us in the field if it does not. An interviewer dare not walk in to court anymore without have read and understood Lamb and Poole at least where if fits historically in forensic interviewing. One day this book will be of the same kind of importance.

BRAVO and Thank You To Lisa.

Buy it here now!

0 comments: