174 ● Anita Gibbs and Kate van Heugten
provide important ideas about enhancing skills, competencies, ethics, research
mindedness, and experiential learning, in ways that promote opportunities for
sociology students to be employed in human service occupations.
Social work’s humanitarian mission of creating a socially just society and
alleviating the oppression of the poorest and most vulnerable sectors of society
(Kam 2014); its core principles of advocacy, human rights, equality, par-
ticipation, and self-determination; and its key frameworks of anti-oppression,
narrative, strengths, and critical reflection, are all focused on a positive regard
for humanity rather than a deficit or problem-oriented outlook. Much of
this will resonate with sociologists who read this book, especially critical and
public sociologists. In chapter 7, readers are introduced to ideas that link
social theory to a range of interventive strategies applied to the social problem
of family poverty. Armstrong believes there is room for a strong partnership
between social work and sociology in solving many social problems (Arm-
strong 2014), and we agree, but we also believe that there are many more areas
beyond social problems for joint theorizing and praxis. We are heartened by
increasing signs of collaboration between the disciplines, as is exemplified by
the yearly International Conference on Sociology and Social Work and in our
personal experiences at the University of Otago and the University of Canter-
bury (this book being one example of such collaboration). In many respects,
the two disciplines might be viewed as interdependent. One might ask, How
can social work exist without acknowledging its sociological heritage, without
continuous discussions between social workers and their sociology colleagues,
without social workers reading the current sociological literature? Although
social workers often do appear to attempt to exist with only scant reference
to sociology, we consider this a grave loss. And conversely, how can sociology
flourish if it remains in denial of its shared history with social work, making
only occasional forays into public and applied sociology or into experiential
learning? We argue in chapter 1 that the two disciplines have moved away
from historical dualisms. In the spirit of pioneers like Jane Addams, who dem-
onstrated that lived experience and scientific methodology can coexist, we are
convinced there is a new era of cooperation ahead. Social work, as an academic
and praxis oriented discipline, has come of age and is ready to claim the place
of the social work imagination in contributing to joint efforts toward solving
complex social problems that no discipline can address alone.
ReferencesArmstrong, Elizabeth. 2014. “Shared Subjects, Divergent Epistemologies: Sociology,
Social Work, and Social Problems Scholarship.” Qualitative Social Work 13 (6):
757–765. doi:10.1177/1473325014542959.