Rachel E. Latta

Training Counseling Psychologists as Social Justice Agents Feminist and Multicultural Principles in Action

Despite recent calls for counseling psychology to embrace social justice-oriented work, there has been little discussion about what such work actually looks like. The first part of this article derives a set of principles from feminist and multicultural counseling theories that counseling psychologists should consider as they engage in social justice work. These include (a) ongoing self-examination,(b) sharing power, (c) giving voice, (d) facilitating consciousness raising, (e) building on strengths, and(f) leaving clients the tools to work toward social change. The second part of the article describes a program designed to integrate social justice work into the core curriculum of the Boston College doctoral program. The authors discuss ways in which the above principles have shaped students; activities, and some of the ethical dilemmas that have emerged. Finally, the article under-scores professional obstacles that counseling psychologists doing social justice work are likely to face, and offers recommendations for overcoming them.

Considering the Interplay of Cultural Context and Service Provision in Intimate Partner Violence The Case of Haitian Immigrant Women

This qualitative study explored how the cultural context of intimate partner violence affected accessibility to mainstream services for one immigrant group: Haitian women. Analysis of the data revealed two major themes. First, the nature and context of intimate partner violence in the Haitian immigrant community contribute to Haitian women’s reluctance to seek services as well as their overall vulnerability to intimate partner violence. Second, mainstream services are largely inaccessible to Haitian women. The authors conclude with suggestions for overcoming cultural barriers through education, increasing cultural competency of mainstream services, and creating alternative community-based services.

Warts and All Personal Reflections on Social Justice in Counseling Psychology. Reply to Kiselica, Palmer, Thompson and Shermis, and Watts

In their comments regarding Goodman, Liang, Helms, Latta, Sparks, and Weintraub’s article “Training Counseling Psychologists as Social Justice Agents: Feminist and Multicultural Principles in Action,” Kiselica, Palmer, Thompson and Shermis, and Watts offered a number of useful suggestions for elaborating on social justice theory, practice, and training. Their reactions and feedback challenged Goodmanet al. to revisit and clarify their thinking about several related issues, including(a)the importance of student and faculty self-examination,(b)the need to ground our social justice theories and practice in organizing philosophies, (c) the difficulties of educating students about social justice work, and (e) the imperative to collaborate across professions. In this reply, the authors discuss each of these issues in turn, noting points of agreement and disagreement with their colleagues.

Intervening in Partner Violence Against Women A Grounded Theory Exploration of Informal Network Members’ Experiences

A large body of cross-sectional and longitudinal research demonstrates the important contribution of informal social networks to the well-being and safety of female survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV). Most survivors turn to family and friends before, during, and after their involvement with formal services; and many rely solely on informal forms of support. Yet surprisingly little research exists on the subjective experiences of informal network members themselves. This study used grounded theory to represent the dynamic and fluid process through which network members become aware of the violence in their friend or family member’s intimate relationship, make meaning of the violence, develop a narrative regarding their own role in the situation, and use that narrative to guide subsequent decision making about whether and how to engage with the survivor and/or abusive partner. The authors discuss implications of this model for developing a range of network-oriented intervention and prevention strategies.

The End of Another Stereotype About Women

In a New York Times story on “Alpha girls,” Margaret Talbott reflected, “It is kind of satisfying to think that girls might be, after their own fashion, as aggressive as boys. It is an idea that offers some relief from the specter of the meek and mopey, ‘silenced’ and self-loathing girl the popular psychology of girlhood has given us in recent years” (Talbot, 2002, p. 27). Talbot’s article is just one of the recent publications that depict the darker side of the gentle sex. Books like Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls (Simmons, 2002) and The Secret Lives of Girls: What Good Girls Really Do—Sex Play, Aggression, and Their Guilt (Lamb, 2002) challenge the feminized view of girls and women as only caring, relational, and connected to others in self-sacrifice. In Women’s Inhumanity to Women, Phyllis Chesler further pries open the Pandora’s box of female intolerance, aggression, and just plain evil. Chesler’s book contains a compendium of horrors women visit on each other. Women are both the battered and the batterer, the sexually abused and the sexually abusive, the dominated and the domineering, the victim and the perpetrator. Chesler describes how female managers treat women employees ruthlessly and female faculty and physicians treat students and patients unethically. Women manipulate, swindle, and rob wealthy “friends;” sleep with their best friend’s husband or partner; scapegoat and humiliate each other; and prevent other women from getting jobs they deserve. Girlfriends are ungrateful for kindness and ruthlessly destroy reputations. Nuns abuse female students, blood sisters are jealous and undermine each other, and mothers-in-law kill their daughters-in-law out of “honor.” And women fail to expose or prevent the rape, harassment, child abuse, incest, and psychological and physical torture of their friends, sisters, and daughters. This is nasty stuff. Chesler is a great storyteller, and her stories of betrayal and abuse include clinical accounts, fictional stories, myths, and fairy tales. She tells stories from interviews she conducted and from the volumes of empirical research she reviewed, and she adds her own personal stories of relationships with women in bold and startling frankness. The number of individual stories of women and girls who have experienced or perpetrated violence gives the impression that women are more vicious than men. While Chesler acknowledges that there is not agreement among the studies concerning the lack of sex difference in aggression, reviews since Eleanor Maccoby and Carol Jacklin’s 1976 book, meta-analytic work on aggression, and violence statistics belie this. Men commit 88% of murders and nearly 100% of rapes. In addition, violent crimes by women against men have decreased by 12%, making it the only kind of homicide to be on the decline in the United States (Jones, 1996). Chesler is fully aware of the problems of universalizing women from the experience of a single group of women, and repeatedly tries to describe intra-group differences by including stories from and studies of women of color and women of different statuses and attributes, where there is evidence. Yet, it still is shocking how much of what we know about women is limited to White women. In fact, Chesler’s work reinforces what others have noted regarding how little research has been conducted on girls’ friendships, gang membership, family membership, familial relationships, and any female behavior that is not gender stereotypic. All relationships of women are scrutinized, but Chesler pays particular attention to the mother-daughter relationship. The recounting of her relationship with her own mother is raw, and her self-reflection is relentless. While this is a valuable aspect of feminist theorizing, it does get repetitive and at times seems onesided. Furthermore, her real-life accounts of horrid mothering rely almost completely on women who suffer from mental illness. Coming from the author of Women and Madness (1972), this is puzzling. Chesler also exposes the ways women’s relational talk can be harmful. Women silence each other, punish with shunning, and destroy reputations through backbiting and gossip, acts that Chesler calls “death by language” (pp. 152–153). Chesler acknowledges that male authority throughout history and across cultures silenced women, and she notes that the prohibition against female gossip serves also as a prohibition against female solidarity. Chesler presents her theory of the roots of women’s inhumanity to women. Her explanations for her observations are primarily derived from psychodynamic theories. Horney, Dinnerstein, Chodorow, and Klein are all covered briefly but to our minds, uncritically. Chesler concludes that women are emotionally needy with an intense longing for affiliation and dependence on each other for interpersonal intimacy. Women “expect constant nurturing from other women” (p. 482) and are “dependent upon each other for interpersonal intimacy” (p. 124). This is the basis for their painful reaction to mistreatment and the foundation for their interpersonal cruelty. Stories of sons’ replacements of the father are well known; Chesler lays bare the stories of the violence caused by younger women’s (daughters, brides, second wives) violent replacement of older women (mothers, mothers-in-law, wives) as they seek the interpersonal intimacy they long for and never quite achieve. Chesler is too much of a feminist to ignore social context within which girls and women are socialized. She acknowledges that women’s inhumanity to

The End of Another Stereotype About Women?Women's Inhumanity to Women, CheslerPhyllis. New York: Thunder Mouth's Press/Nation Books, 2001. 551 pp.,

In a New York Times story on “Alpha girls,” Margaret Talbott reflected, “It is kind of satisfying to think that girls might be, after their own fashion, as aggressive as boys. It is an idea that offers some relief from the specter of the meek and mopey, ‘silenced’ and self-loathing girl the popular psychology of girlhood has given us in recent years” (Talbot, 2002, p. 27). Talbot’s article is just one of the recent publications that depict the darker side of the gentle sex. Books like Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls (Simmons, 2002) and The Secret Lives of Girls: What Good Girls Really Do—Sex Play, Aggression, and Their Guilt (Lamb, 2002) challenge the feminized view of girls and women as only caring, relational, and connected to others in self-sacrifice. In Women’s Inhumanity to Women, Phyllis Chesler further pries open the Pandora’s box of female intolerance, aggression, and just plain evil. Chesler’s book contains a compendium of horrors women visit on each other. Women are both the battered and the batterer, the sexually abused and the sexually abusive, the dominated and the domineering, the victim and the perpetrator. Chesler describes how female managers treat women employees ruthlessly and female faculty and physicians treat students and patients unethically. Women manipulate, swindle, and rob wealthy “friends;” sleep with their best friend’s husband or partner; scapegoat and humiliate each other; and prevent other women from getting jobs they deserve. Girlfriends are ungrateful for kindness and ruthlessly destroy reputations. Nuns abuse female students, blood sisters are jealous and undermine each other, and mothers-in-law kill their daughters-in-law out of “honor.” And women fail to expose or prevent the rape, harassment, child abuse, incest, and psychological and physical torture of their friends, sisters, and daughters. This is nasty stuff. Chesler is a great storyteller, and her stories of betrayal and abuse include clinical accounts, fictional stories, myths, and fairy tales. She tells stories from interviews she conducted and from the volumes of empirical research she reviewed, and she adds her own personal stories of relationships with women in bold and startling frankness. The number of individual stories of women and girls who have experienced or perpetrated violence gives the impression that women are more vicious than men. While Chesler acknowledges that there is not agreement among the studies concerning the lack of sex difference in aggression, reviews since Eleanor Maccoby and Carol Jacklin’s 1976 book, meta-analytic work on aggression, and violence statistics belie this. Men commit 88% of murders and nearly 100% of rapes. In addition, violent crimes by women against men have decreased by 12%, making it the only kind of homicide to be on the decline in the United States (Jones, 1996). Chesler is fully aware of the problems of universalizing women from the experience of a single group of women, and repeatedly tries to describe intra-group differences by including stories from and studies of women of color and women of different statuses and attributes, where there is evidence. Yet, it still is shocking how much of what we know about women is limited to White women. In fact, Chesler’s work reinforces what others have noted regarding how little research has been conducted on girls’ friendships, gang membership, family membership, familial relationships, and any female behavior that is not gender stereotypic. All relationships of women are scrutinized, but Chesler pays particular attention to the mother-daughter relationship. The recounting of her relationship with her own mother is raw, and her self-reflection is relentless. While this is a valuable aspect of feminist theorizing, it does get repetitive and at times seems onesided. Furthermore, her real-life accounts of horrid mothering rely almost completely on women who suffer from mental illness. Coming from the author of Women and Madness (1972), this is puzzling. Chesler also exposes the ways women’s relational talk can be harmful. Women silence each other, punish with shunning, and destroy reputations through backbiting and gossip, acts that Chesler calls “death by language” (pp. 152–153). Chesler acknowledges that male authority throughout history and across cultures silenced women, and she notes that the prohibition against female gossip serves also as a prohibition against female solidarity. Chesler presents her theory of the roots of women’s inhumanity to women. Her explanations for her observations are primarily derived from psychodynamic theories. Horney, Dinnerstein, Chodorow, and Klein are all covered briefly but to our minds, uncritically. Chesler concludes that women are emotionally needy with an intense longing for affiliation and dependence on each other for interpersonal intimacy. Women “expect constant nurturing from other women” (p. 482) and are “dependent upon each other for interpersonal intimacy” (p. 124). This is the basis for their painful reaction to mistreatment and the foundation for their interpersonal cruelty. Stories of sons’ replacements of the father are well known; Chesler lays bare the stories of the violence caused by younger women’s (daughters, brides, second wives) violent replacement of older women (mothers, mothers-in-law, wives) as they seek the interpersonal intimacy they long for and never quite achieve. Chesler is too much of a feminist to ignore social context within which girls and women are socialized. She acknowledges that women’s inhumanity to