Culture and Identity

The engaging stories featured in this book are easy to read, as each storyteller tells their real life struggles with identity development, life events, family relationships and family history. Each chapter contains a discussion of content themes, along with clinical applications, including assessment questions, techniques and interventions, and countertransference or personal reactions evoked from the stories. Readers will enhance their understanding of intra-group differences, increase their repertoire of clinical skills, and sharpen their multicultural competency.

Author Biography

Anita Jones Thomas, PhD, is a counseling psychologist with specializations in multicultural counseling and family therapy, and is currently an Dean and Professor of the School of Psychological Sciences at the University of Indianapolis. She received a bachelor’s degree in human development and social policy from Northwestern University and a master’s degree in community counseling from Loyola University Chicago. Her doctorate in counseling psychology was received from Loyola University Chicago. Her research interests include critical consciousness, and racial identity, racial socialization, and parenting issues for African Americans. She has also conducted training seminars and workshops on multicultural issues for state and national professional organizations in counseling and psychology, hospitals, and corporations and has served as a consultant for human service organizations. Dr. Thomas has served and chaired the Committee on Children, Youth, and Families of the American Psychological Association, and the Task Force on Resilience and Strength and Black Children and Adolescents, and is on the board for the Society for Child and Family Policy and Practice.

Sara Schwarzbaum, EdD, LMFT, LCPC, is a retired Professor in the department of Counselor Education and a coordinator of the Master’s in Couple and Family Counseling Program at Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago. She is also the founder of Couples Counseling Associates in Chicago. She has a master’s degree in clinical psychology from Buenos Aires, Argentina and doctoral degree in counseling with an emphasis in family therapy from Northern Illinois University.  She has written articles that have appeared in the Psychotherapy Networker, Counseling Today and other publications. She is a consultant, trainer, and presenter at state and national conferences where she frequently conducts workshops on clinical issues with Latino clients, the multicultural competency of clinicians, psychotherapy with immigrants and families, and marriage counseling.