Sociology and Social Work

Sociology and Social Work: Kaleidoscopic Perspectives of Social Reality. Towards an integrated and complex model of analysis

Cristina Albuquerque
Clara Cruz Santos
Helena Neves Almeida

University of Coimbra

Abstract:
In this article we will try to discuss the specificities and connexions between Social Work and Sociology, conceiving the possibility to surpass sterile oppositions and to compose an analytical and practical integrated model by the articulation, without assimilation, of the two disciplines.
In fact, many traditions and trends in Sociology, particularly from the Sociology of Action and Critical Sociology, have contributed to a critical questioning of the modern Social Work professional practice, namely about the processes and strategies of social control and the paradox underlying the dissociation between the theoretical-philosophical assumptions of Social Work and its actual practice, frequently with paternalistic and normative outlines. On the other hand, some perspectives of Social Work, specially on what concerns the comprehension and evaluation of social policies and social needs, have also an important role in the (re)construction of sociological analytical perspectives. Following such assumptions, we will discuss, in the first part of the article, the analytic and methodological crossings between Social Work and Sociology, in order to consider, in the second part, the possibilities and pertinence of an osmotic and truly interdisciplinary model integrating both disciplines. Keywords: Social Work; Sociology; Complementary Model

1.Introduction : The kaleidoscopic Frame

The comprehension of inequalities, of its structural elements and of the dissemination and reproduction processes is inscribed as an essential element of the political and professional project of Social Work. This way social work refuses its reduction to a “social technology” and consolidates a unique analytical perspective evident in the mediation among the

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