Encounters between bodies and its implications on the professional relationship in social work practice: a Chinese fieldwork case

Abstract

Although the discussion regarding the importance of the lived body in social work practice gradually emerged in Western academia, situated and embodied experience and reflective work remain to be ascertained in Chinese background. The theme of this article is to reflect on the fieldwork I conducted for ethnographic research which explores the lived experience of people affected by cleft lip and palate (CLP) in a Chinese hospital as a social worker. Body, as the central theoretical concept and perspective in the topic of CLP, is used to analyse complex encounters among different roles in concrete medical situations, which allows me to systematically reflect on how encounters between bodies both create and redefine researcher-participant and client-social worker relationships. Findings show that: 1) the body of social workers and clients and both involved in defining and creating the body imagination of ‘normal people' and ‘normal life'. ‘Becoming normal' gradually was generated by clients as a topic and life goal through working with social workers and the treatment team; 2) Although suffering from facial deformity and the complicated treatment scheme, people with CLP develop body techniques (tolerance of pain, spirit of perseverance, maturity of thinking) to negotiate with social workers to redefine the meaning of ‘normal life’ and build self-identity; 3) Social workers play a model of normal people with normal life, but also a source of knowledge production. Social worker-client relationship establishes a context of increasing intimacy in which wordless interchanges between bodies but also produce knowledge of normality. Methodologically, the body could be a critical practice tool to inform our understanding of professional relationships. As tacit knowledge and unexpected impact in practice, I suggest the lived body could be an essential analysis dimension in social work assessment. It can be critical reflections for body-cognizant social workers who support people with physical differences and disabilities.