SOCIAL WORK THEORY IN NEPAL AND CREDIBILITY OF THE PROFESSION
SOCIAL WORK THEORY IN NEPAL AND CREDIBILITY OF THE PROFESSION
Theories are taught in class room and trainees practice or implement those theories in field work. Theory helps to enhance knowledge to a great extent and field work helps to develop skills to a great extent. There are many disciplines in Nepal; but now-a- days students are attracted to social work field because of such unique characteristics of social work education.
Till yesterday, students first studied the subjects, they wrote the exam and when they tried to apply those theories they failed to implement those theories in practice. But s
There are approximately 40 colleges and four universities, which offer social work education in Nepal. Exact statistics of social workers is not available.
Social work is a subject which mainly focuses on theoretical and practical aspects equally. Generally, the social work students have been placed in different types of agencies, communities, VDC office, Government, Non-government, and International Non-Government Agencies to practice the theories which they studied in class room. It gives knowledge as well as skill to work with individuals, group, community, administration, research and social action if needed. Students practice these six methods of social work.
As we all know, social work is an imported profession from western countries. Western ideology and philosophy regarding social work always dominate over the developing countries' ideology and philosophy. Desai (2002), states that the Indian society is structured by families and communities, where as the Western social work approach is individualistic. The Indian religions emphasize duties whereas the western liberalism emphasizes freedom as the goal. While the Indian ideologies are holistic and wisdom oriented, the American professional ideologies are analytical and scientific”.
Nepal and India are neighboring countries and the social and religious structure of Nepal and India has somewhat similar. Whatever Desai has stated about social work practice in India are also applicable in Nepal. There are also differences between Nepali society and western society. If the society is different, culture is different, situation is different, it is sure that the principles, theory, and practice pattern should be different. Social Work should focus on indigenous context. If you teach a child “A” for “Aero plane” it is difficult to understand for those children who never got a chance to see the plane; but if you teach “A” for “Ant”, it is easy to understand because we are familiar with ants. Social Work trainees face the same kind of difficulty in field work. Nepalese Social work trainees tried to practice western theories, methods, and principles which are difficult to apply in Nepalese context.
Social workers talk about six methods of social work: Social Case Work, Social Group Work, Community Organization, Social Welfare Administration, Social Work Research and Social Action. All have their own values, principles, procedures, techniques and so on. In western countries, people live individual life, so they mostly have psychological problems and in case work theories, we mostly talk about clinical social work, psychiatric social work and other individual emotion related problems. In group work, Social work trainees are informed about the procedures of selection of members, and others in the same way. But in Nepalese context, mostly, people love to live with family that gives emotional support. So, people of developing countries, generally face less psychological torture because they have medium and resource to share their feelings which is not easily available in western countries. For a Social worker a client is a person who has problem and s/he comes to the Social Worker to seek help. But in our context, or when we are practicing field work, we have to findout the clients by ourselves. In western countries, clients easily share their problems which we cannot see in Nepal. People feel hesitant to share their pain and sorrow to others or in front of an unknown person who is going to treat him as a client.
Social work is thus an imported as well as a developing profession. To build credibility of this profession, a practitioner should focus on indigenous values, principles, methods which are suitable in Nepalese context.
Comments
Post a Comment