Proceedings of the National Conference of Charities and Correction, at the Annual Session Held in (Volume 42) (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1915. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... THE SOCIAL CASE WORKER IN A CHANGING WORLD Mary E. Richmond, Director, Charity Organization Department, Russell Sage Foundation, New York, N. Y. "II is not easy," says one of our modern musical critics, "to discuss recent painting with people who believe that Futurism and Post Impressionism are the same thing; or to discuss recent music with people who ask you 'if you like such composers as Strauss and Debussy.'" Our own social work terminology is in even more of a muddle, so that it is necessary to explain at the very outset that by the none too happy title of social case work we mean that half of social work which has to do with the social treatment of individuals, individual by individual, as distinguished from all those processes of social reform which deal with individuals in masses. I realize that a great deal of case work does not deserve to be described as "social" and that many reform measures, put forward in all sincerity, are not truly "reforms," but the comparisons made here must be confined to the good of each kind. Social case work does different things for and with different people--it specializes and differentiates; social reform generalizes and simplifies by discovering ways of doing the same thing for everybody. Together it is possible for them to achieve social wellbeing; acting separately and more or less at cross purposes they achieve only the most partial and transitory results. The only kind of social case work in which I believe, therefore, and the only kind to which I shall refer today may be defined as the art of doing different things for and with different people by co-operating with them to achieve at one and the same time their own and society's betterment. Such work is not confined to any particular group of agencies, of cou...