Clinical Social Work Journal - Call for Papers: Global Insights into Clinical Social Work with Sexual and Gender Diverse/Expansive People

The Clinical Social Work Journal (CSWJ) is pleased to announce a call for papers for a special issue entitled “Global Insights into Clinical Social Work with Sexual and Gender Diverse/Expansive People.”  Trevor G. Gates, PhD, LCSW, Assistant Professor at Colorado State University Pueblo, Bindi Bennett, PhD, Professorial Research Fellow at Centre for Reconciliation, Truth, and Justice at Federation University Australia, and Anh Tu Hoang, MD, PhD, Executive Director at Center for Creative Initiatives in Health and Population Vietnam will serve as guest co-editors. 

This special issue seeks manuscripts that provide clinical social workers with a deeper understanding of clinical social work practice with LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and gender diverse/expansive, and queer+) people across the globe.  We seek papers from various cultures/countries that explore how gender-sensitive clinical interventions are offered in various global locations. 

Such papers could include manuscripts that focus on the challenges clinical social workers experience in providing such services in their communities given the context of those communities, as well as affirming practices with this population. We also seek papers that explore the unique clinical issues that clinical social workers see in those communities given the local attitudes and legal rights in those contexts.

Due to the diversity of jurisdictional clinical social work standards, the guest co-editors welcome papers that include a range of theoretical, practice, research, and other frameworks.  While abstracts and manuscripts must be submitted in English, we especially encourage submissions from East Asia and the Pacific and other regions historically underrepresented in English-language journals. 

We also invite practitioners with lived experience in sexual and gender diverse/expansive communities to include positionality statements in their abstracts and manuscripts.

Some examples of topics for this special issue could include, but are not limited to issues related to:

• Papers that conceptualize LGBTQ+ allyship and inclusion as part of building a therapeutic working alliance with sexual and gender diverse/expansive people 
• Papers that  investigate the potential of allyship and inclusivity as a therapeutic approach in clinical social work. For example, manuscripts that talk about how having a supportive clinical social worker was helpful in building trust in the therapeutic relationship would be welcome.
• The International Federation of Social Workers urges social workers to safeguard LGBTQ+ individuals from homophobic and transphobic brutality, while also preventing torture and mistreatment that is cruel, inhumane, or degrading. Clinical case studies, especially from underrepresented regions like the global South, that showcase trauma-informed strategies for helping LGBTQ+ individuals who have undergone such mistreatment.
• Evaluations of the efficacy of culturally responsive, locally anchored mental health interventions with LGBTQ+ individuals. 
• Critical papers that talk about how their clients have felt empowered through therapy to then advocate for social change.
• Anti-oppressive and critical clinical practice approaches used in therapeutic working relationships that aim to build trust by challenging colonialism, heteronormativity, and Whiteness.
• Papers that center the voices of practitioners or clients with intersectional Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and LGBTQ+ identities. 
• Empirical research that involves co-designed clinical projects authored with gender diverse, two-spirit, brotherboys, sistergirls, and other underrepresented Indigenous communities anchored in the therapeutic relationship and what the outcomes of that support are.
• Clinical social work case studies of mental health practice with LGBTQ+ individuals in international contexts that use critical autoethnography, single case design, or other approaches.
• Papers on groups that support the social and emotional well-being of transgender, gender diverse, and gender expansive youth.

Authors interested in submitting a manuscript should submit an abstract of no more than 500 words. Abstracts should be sent to trevor.gatescrandall@cspueblo.edu (this opens in a new tab). Following selection, those chosen will be invited to submit full manuscripts of 15-20 pages. 

Deadlines for the process:

• Abstracts should be submitted by August 25. 2023. 
• Invitations for full manuscripts will be sent out by October 27, 2023. 
• Full manuscripts should be submitted by February 25, 2024.

If you have any questions, please contact Trevor Gates at trevor.gatescrandall@csupueblo.edu (this opens in a new tab).