Socioculturally Attuned Family Therapy: Guidelines for Equitable Theory and Practice

Socioculturally Attuned Family Therapy, 2nd edition, is a fully updated and essential textbook that addresses the need for marriage and family therapists to engage in socially responsible practice by infusing diversity, equity, and inclusion throughout theory and clinical practice.

Written accessibly by leaders in the field, this new edition explores why sociocultural attunement and equity matter, providing students and clinicians with integrative, equity-based family therapy guidelines and case illustrations that clinicians can apply to their practice. The authors integrate principles of societal context, power, and equity into the core concepts and practice of ten major family therapy models, such as structural family therapy, narrative family therapy, and Bowen family systems, with this new edition including a chapter on socio-emotional relationship therapy. Paying close attention to the "how to’s" of changes processes, updates include the use of more diverse voices that describe the creative application of this framework, the use of reflexive questions that can be used in class, and further content on supervision. It shows how the authors have moved their thinking forward, such as in clinical thinking, change, and ethics infused in everyday practice from a third order perspective, and the limits and applicability of SCAFT as a transtheoretical, transnational approach.

Fitting COAMFTE, CACREP, APA, and CSWE requirements for social justice and cultural diversity, this new edition is revised to include current cultural and societal changes, such as Black Lives Matter, other social movements, and environmental justice. It is an essential textbook for students of marriage, couple, and family therapy and important reading for family therapists, supervisors, counselors, and any practitioner wanting to apply a critical consciousness to their work.

Teresa McDowell, EdD, is a professor of marriage, couple, and family therapy and chair of the Department of Counseling Psychology at Lewis & Clark Graduate School of Education and Counseling in Portland, Oregon. She is a licensed marriage and family therapist, AAMFT clinical fellow and approved supervisor. Her work includes a focus on applying critical social theory to family therapy practice.

Carmen Knudson-Martin, PhD, LMFT, is a professor and director of the marriage, couple, and family therapy program at Lewis & Clark Graduate School of Education and Counseling. She is a past president of the American Association for Marital and Family Therapy, California Division, and recipient of the 2017 Distinguished Contribution to Family Therapy and Practice award from the American Family Therapy Academy. She is a founder of socio-emotional relationship therapy.

J. Maria Bermudez, PhD, is an associate professor in the marriage and family therapy program in the Department of Human Development and Family Science at the University of Georgia. She is an AAMFT clinical fellow and approved supervisor and licensed marriage and family therapist. Her work is anchored in feminist-informed and culturally responsive approaches to therapy, research, and supervision.