Increasing awareness of racial identity among white social workers - a narrative approach

Abstract

This study was developed on the premise that lack of white racial identity awareness is a contributor to the experience of racism in the social services by Indigenous people. It sought to increase racial identity awareness among social workers who identified as white. This study was a process evaluation intended to discover if individuals felt that their racial identity awareness had changed after participating in the study. Nine social workers were interviewed before and after an intervention, in which they spent two hours a week, for eight weeks, in a narrative working group examining whiteness. Data was analyzed using dialogical/performative analysis examined through the lens of critical whiteness theory, and an Indigenous framework. The findings indicated that participants felt an increase in their ability to talk about whiteness and more confidence in addressing racism in their lives and workplaces after participating in this study.