Multicultural guidance

If the European dream of greater mobility between countries comes true, multicultural guidance will gradually grow in importance.

The staff of Euroguidance centres have, for some time, been calling out for more training. The first training for the staff of the Euroguidance centres, organised by the Further training working group of the Euroguidance network, took place in Warsaw in May this year and was on the subject of multicultural guidance.

Our trainers were Mr. Mika Launikari, who for many years worked at the Euroguidance centre in Finland but is now the project manager of guidance issues at Cedefop and Dr. Sauli Puukari, lecturer in guidance at the University of Jyväskylä in Finland.

Multicultural guidance will demand changed approaches in counsellors’ work

The strongest message of the training was that if Europe continues to develop in the way it has for the past decades, multicultural guidance is something which will gradually affect all counsellors, regardless of how remotely they live and work.

Successful multicultural guidance demands, more than anything else, the ability of the counsellors to understand their own cultural background and to be able to understand that their clients have a different one, which makes them feel, think and act differently from what is considered to be the norm.

The counsellor will need assistance with this difficult task and strong connections to the immigrant society are helpful. Good communication with the parents of foreign children and community leaders of various types (e.g. religious leaders or members of cultural groups), would be a good starting point.

Normally the adaptation process to a new culture comes in several stages. It probably starts with the euphoria of living in a society which gives more options than the old one did. But, this is usually followed by frustrations in discovering how difficult it is to adapt. For most people this leads to a certain resistance and a strong returning to their own culture.

Those who come through this stage and still live in their new countries begin to see that both their old societies and their new ones have their good aspects as well as their bad ones. The final stage is a complete adaptation to the new culture, which is something that only a few people who move from one society to another as adults, master.

Relatives and cultural communities can be valuable allies
 
For counsellors it is important to take into account that people may not move through these stages smoothly and evenly. Rather, they can jump back and forth in a pattern, which is not understandable by someone who has grown up in the society in question.

For those guiding children and young adults, it must also be remembered that they may not agree with their parents’ decision to move to another country and may therefore resist adopting even more than their parents do.

In multicultural guidance the communication between the counsellor and the client can be a challenge due to the language difficulties. The client may not understand the language very well and, even if (s)he does, may interpret it in a different way than the one the counsellor intends.

In many European societies, the main influx of immigrants comes from Asia and Africa where the verbal message only forms a tiny part of the communication. They are used to “listening” carefully to what is not said and interpret physical gestures as the main message. They can see the counsellor as a representative of the authorities and can therefore see him/her as threatening or dangerous. Counsellors are therefore advised to try to get professional interpreters if they have even the slightest doubt that their clients understand them and can respond in a manner that the counsellors understand.

Women’s and men’s roles

The aspect of gender can make multicultural counselling extremely difficult. Each society has its own way of defining men’s and women’s roles and the counsellor may need to be wary of issues such as a family’s resistance to immigrant girls being given an equal chance in the school system if their fathers, uncles and leaders of their communities do not accept this. Instances can occur whereby counsellors reassure fathers that their daughters can study safely in a mixed gender school, for example.

Launikari and Puukari edited a book "Multicultural Guidance and Counselling in 2005". The book can be downloaded here:
Multicultural Guidance and Counselling

Dóra Stefánsdóttir, Euroguidance Iceland