Type:	Journal Article
Title:	Multicultural men and family relationships services - challenges and successes
Other Titles:	Family Services Australia Newsletter
Authors:	Bhattacharjee, Sandip
Keywords:	Cross-cultural;CALD (culturally and linguistically diverse)
Year:	2000
Publisher:	Family Services Australia
Citation:	(23), December 2000
Notes:	This paper reports on the development of a pilot Multicultural Men and Family Relationships Services programme in the Fairfield/Cabramatta area of Sydney. The programme evolved out of the need for an increase in services that target men from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds whose families are experiencing breakdown, domestic violence and child abuse. The programme focuses on increasing the involvement and responsibility of these men in their family life. It looks at the structural and cultural barriers that these men face to accessing family relationship services such as: inability to attend counselling due to shift work, language, difference in cultural understandings of what relationships are and what is acceptable within these relationships and reluctance to attend counselling or contact social services. The programme involves community development, groups for non-English speaking men and conjoint work with couples, the last controversial as an approach when the presenting issue is violence. It has successfully reached out to many men and ethnic communities in the metropolitan west area of Sydney, including Vietnamese, Khmer, Lao and Chinese. In conclusion, the paper discusses the lack of professional training and service resources that focus on men and fathers from non-English speaking backgrounds, recommending that this must be positively addressed by policy makers and individual service providers.
URI:	https://anrows.intersearch.com.au/anrowsjspui/handle/1/15891
ISSN:	14402688
Appears in Collections:	Journal Articles

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