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Welcome to the Sociology 205 Marriage and the Family Research Guide! Here you will find relevant books, databases, and more resources to assist you in your studies, research, and writing.
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How our reliance on Child Protective Services makes motherhood precarious for those already marginalized It's the knock on the door that many mothers fear: a visit from Child Protective Services (CPS), the state agency with the power to take their children away. Over the last half-century, these encounters have become an all-too-common way of trying to address family poverty and adversity. One in three children nationwide--and half of Black children--now encounter CPS during childhood. In Investigating Families, Kelley Fong provides an unprecedented look at the inner workings of CPS and the experiences of families pulled into its orbit. Drawing on firsthand observations of CPS investigations and hundreds of interviews with those involved, Fong traces the implications of invoking CPS as a "first responder" to family misfortune and hardship. She shows how relying on CPS--an entity fundamentally oriented around parental wrongdoing and empowered to separate families--organizes the response to adversity around surveilling, assessing, and correcting marginalized mothers. The agency's far-reaching investigative apparatus undermines mothers' sense of security and shapes how they marshal resources for their families, reinforcing existing inequalities. And even before CPS comes knocking, mothers feel vulnerable to a system that jeopardizes their parenthood. Countering the usual narratives of punitive villains and hapless victims, Fong's unique, behind-the-scenes account tells a revealing story of how we try to protect children by threatening mothers--and points the way to a more productive path for families facing adversity.
How can therapists feel prepared to address the possible treatment focus of ruptured maternal relationships in the therapeutic space? Depending on the client, the goal of therapy may be to repair an estranged maternal relationship or to finalize parental estrangement and redefine themself. This book focuses on identifying the estrangement cycle for clinical application with adult women clients by mental health professionals. It provides clinical tools to address the challenges of estrangement and adjustment needs of these clients within the spheres of personal identity, relationships, and grief and loss to promote personal growth and healing in the therapeutic space. It also engages readers by illustrating different stages of estrangement through client vignettes and by providing practical tools for mental health professionals to create a supportive and nonjudgmental space. With this resource, clinicians and clients will feel better equipped with the skills needed to tackle the emotional rollercoaster that is Estrangement Energy. The companion resource website can be found here: https://www.estrangementenergycycle.com/
Co-sponsored by the National Guardianship Association Serving as guardian is never simple or easy. Having the responsibility to make major life decisions for another is much more difficult than making decisions for oneself. Recent studies by the National Center for State Courts estimate that between one to two million adults are under court-supervised guardianship. The Administrative Conference of the United States estimates that approximately 75 percent of guardians are family members or friends. A constant refrain in multiple national studies and legislative reports is that once guardians are appointed they receive little instruction on how to carry out their responsibilities and have few resources to guide them. The new edition of Fundamentals of Guardianship is the much-needed, basic manual for new guardians that explains those roles and responsibilities. The court orders guardians to make decisions; Fundamentals of Guardianship explains how to make those decisions. It guides the new guardian step-by-step through the process of how to make responsible and ethical decisions, prudently manage another's resources, avoid conflicts of interest, and involve the person under guardianship in the decision process. Fundamentals of Guardianship is the authoritative resource written by guardians with decades of experience and members of the National Guardianship Association. This book will appeal to all who have been appointed as guardian or conservator, whether lawyer, family member, friend, volunteer, or public or private entity, as well as all those who serve vulnerable adults. Included on this list are judges, court administrators, law enforcement officials, adult protective services, social workers, health care providers, case managers, residential care administrators, long-term care ombudsmen, financial institutions, and financial advisors.
"Offers hope in the face of desperate odds" - ELLE Magazine, ELLE's Most Anticipated Books of Summer 2020 "[D]isturbing and unforgettable memoir...This wrenching story brings to vivid life the plight of the many families separated at the U.S.-Mexico border." - Publisher's Weekly, STARRED REVIEW "[The] haunting and eloquent...narrative of a Guatemalan woman's desperate search for a better life." -Kirkus, STARRED Review PEOPLE Magazine Best Books of Summer 2020 TIME Magazine Best Books of Summer 2020 PARADE Best Books of Summer 2020 Compelling and urgently important, The Book of Rosy is the unforgettable story of one brave mother and her fight to save her family. When Rosayra "Rosy" Pablo Cruz made the agonizing decision to seek asylum in the United States with two of her children, she knew the journey would be arduous, dangerous, and quite possibly deadly. But she had no choice: violence--from gangs, from crime, from spiraling chaos--was making daily life hell. Rosy knew her family's one chance at survival was to flee Guatemala and go north. After a brutal journey that left them dehydrated, exhausted, and nearly starved, Rosy and her two little boys arrived at the Arizona border. Almost immediately they were seized and forcibly separated by government officials under the Department of Homeland Security's new "zero tolerance" policy. To her horror Rosy discovered that her flight to safety had only just begun. In The Book of Rosy, with an unprecedented level of sharp detail and soulful intimacy, Rosy tells her story, aided by Julie Schwietert Collazo, founder of Immigrant Families Together, the grassroots organization that reunites mothers and children. She reveals the cruelty of the detention facilities, the excruciating pain of feeling her children ripped from her arms, the abiding faith that staved off despair--and the enduring friendship with Julie, which helped her navigate the darkness and the bottomless Orwellian bureaucracy. A gripping account of the human cost of inhumane policies, The Book of Rosy is also a paean to the unbreakable will of people united by true love, a sense of justice, and hope for a better future.
When child advocate Keri Vellis began fostering two severely abused and traumatized siblings, her role expanded beyond caregiving. She became their voice within an often inconsistent and patchwork system. Her memoir presents a vision of what could be and underscores the urgent need to reform the way society's forgotten children are cared for.
Analyzes the influence of technology and social media on human development with parents and families in mind. This is a story about a family coming of age at the same time as smartphones and social media; a multiracial family coming into its own as windows into social injustice opened up before our very screens; and a multi-parent multi-professional family with children living differently depending on which house and which combination of family members happen to be home. While it is a story about a family, it is really the story of technological and global changes unfolding on our doorsteps. While many revile the ascendance of smartphones and social media and the way they suck us into the vortex of cyberspace, there are cultural touchpoints that reflect deeper human and technology development patterns, patterns which we would all do well to understand, no matter whether or how we choose to engage in the ever-innovating digital frontiers. Informed by research and interviews with leaders in policy, human development, ethics, and technology Loretta Brady helps readers understand the complex systemic challenges and findings related to technology and human development. We do not have to hate or fear technology. It is neither friend nor foe. But understanding its impact on our daily lives is paramount to cultivating a healthier relationship both with our digital lives and our real, lived ones.
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Research assistance - help finding sources, evaluating sources
Online workshops for citing and plagiarism are held throughout the semester. To request a citing workshop, please email library@rcbc.edu