Postmodern Social Work

Book excerpt: How should social workers adapt to a time of widespread instability and uncertainty? How can social work practice account for the ever-increasing infiltration of technology and media images into our daily lives and mental states? In this book, Ken Moffatt turns to postmodern philosophy’s grappling with late capitalism and the omnipresence of technology in order to develop a new approach to reflective social work practice and critical pedagogy. Postmodern Social Work attempts to reconcile postmodern thinkers with the realities of teaching social work to diverse student populations in a precarious era. Moffatt advocates an ideal of reflective practice that allows social workers to combine direct experience, social welfare, and social justice. Through a series of interlocking essays focused on the theoretical underpinnings of reflective practice in the context of social work education, he explores the implications of postmodern theory for social work practice. Drawing on thinkers such as Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, Julia Kristeva, Gilles Deleuze, and Félix Guattari, Moffatt lays out a path forward for reflective social work, providing new ways of thinking that collapse old categories and integrate direct practice with community engagement and social analysis. Postmodern Social Work offers an approach to practice and teaching that considers the shifting landscape of social change while remaining true to social work’s primary concerns of inclusion and justice.