"A beautiful foreword by Eliana Gil and a very helpful preface and introduction by the editor, Lisa Aronson Fontes, elucidate the many ways in which culture is relevant to sexual abuse. They set the personal tone and the fresh scholarly information that characterizes the chapters. The reader is treated to an impressive, state-of-the-art array of ideas on culture that opens new avenues for inquiry. The book also offers a new repertoire of rituals and healing practices, such as 'sitting shiva' to deal with the losses of sexual abuse for the Jewish family, or a version of 'dusmic' (a term coined by Nuyorican poets) strength to empower Puerto Rican clients. . . . From a practical point of view, this book belongs on the office shelf of all individual and family therapists. They will obtain rich guidance about treatment approaches, therapist-client cultural matching, and prevention strategies that are both more humane and more effective because they are culturally attuned and deepen the knowledge of the cultural context of abuse." --Celia Jaes Falicov in Journal of Marriage and Family Therapy (forthcoming issue) "The overall effect of this edited volume reflects a sense of unity and teamwork. The writing is thorough and thought-provoking. It maintains consistency and originality, while presenting individual issues about the influence of unique cultural factors in working with abuse survivors." --Paula T. McWhirter in Contemporary Psychology "This volume of original chapters is an important contribution to understanding the relationship between culture and child sexual abuse. Lisa Aronson Fontes has edited a thought-provoking collection of papers along with an excellent foreword by Eliana Gil. . . . This book has much to recommend it, not only to the clinician to whom it is geared, but also to the researcher, the policy maker, and the wider community concerned with child sexual abusee." --Jill E. Korbin in Child Abuse & Neglect "The book makes an important contribution to cross-cultural awareness and widens the limited knowledge base about child sexual abuse within the cultural groups concerned. . . . The text promotes 'an ecosystemic approach to sexual abuse' that takes into account individual, familial, cultural, and societal factors. Therapists, protective workers, and law enforcers, as well as legal, medical, and school personnel and policymakers should find this book a useful tool." --Fred Seligman in READINGS: A Journal of Reviews and Commentary in Mental Health How can we best prevent and treat sexual abuse in diverse populations? Cultural and linguistic misunderstandings, racism, and even homophobia sometimes lead professionals to mishandle issues of sexual abuse. This volume breaks new ground in suggesting ways in which cultural norms can be used to protect children and promote recovery from sexual abuse. It contains information that can be applied to people from all groups as well as nine solution-focused chapters on sexual abuse in the following specific groups: African Americans, Asian Americans, Anglo Americans, Puerto Ricans, Cambodians, Seventh Day Adventists, Jews, gay men, and lesbian women. Sexual Abuse in Nine North American Cultures is the first major work to address cultural issues in family violence. It is essential reading for advanced students, therapists, protective workers, sociologists, psychologists, anthropologists, attorneys, police, educators, and others interested in adults and children who have been sexually abused. "Sexual Abuse in Nine North American Cultures has been masterfully sculpted to give us individual perceptions of cultures by professionals who were influenced by and who currently provide services to families and communities in distress. . . . This volume is provocative, personal, and professional; it is both abstract and concrete. It struggles with how to discuss the diversity within cultures without wavering from its overall goal of providing basic historical premises for diverse cultures. . . . It also provides an uncharacteristic view of culture that reaches beyond race and ethnicity. . . . The contribution of the book is not only in the information it so aptly presents but also in the way it encourages the reader to think and in the assertion that clinicians must enlighten and empower themselves when working cross-culturally, approaching issues of culture with rigorous attention and sensitivity." --from the Foreword by Eliana Gil "By drawing on these resources, clinicians optimize their chances of meeting their stated goal: to be of assistance to families so that the quality of their lives is improved and children are safe and nurtured." --from the Foreword by Eliana Gil ***PRESS RELEASE*** The sexual abuse of children poses surprisingly different problems among different cultural groups, a groundbreaking new book reveals. Sexual abuse should not be treated with "generic" approaches based on the lives of white middle-class European American Christians, according to Dr. Lisa Aronson Fontes, editor of Sexual Abuse in Nine North Amarican Cultures. For example, the book points out that African American mothers tend to believe a daughter's complaint about sexual abuse more readily than white mothers, whereas Asian mothers are more likely to think their daughter is lying. In this volume, Dr. Fontes, Assistant Professor of Family Therapy at Purdue University, assembles nine original chapters by experts who treat sexual abuse in their own cultures. The chapter on Asian Americans says these families reject children's reports of sexual abuse most often because the entire family "loses face" with the disclosure, and the victims' mothers are exceptionally dependent on their menfolk. In one study of 60 Asian American families in which incest was disclosed, only four mothers separated from their perpetrator husbands. Seventh Day Adventists and members of other evangelical religions have "high rates of sexual child abuse," according to another chapter, because these religions stress the "subjugation of women and children to the man of the house." If a girl discloses abuse, evangelical church members may blame her for immodest dress or seductive behavior. She is instructed to forgive her abuser and "talk to God, not outsiders." According to the chapter on Hispanic American families, these families may suffer from a "machismo/marianismo" double standard. A Latina female must be chaste and self-sacrificing like the Virgin Mary, while the code of machismo may prompt a Latino male to consume excessive alcohol and "constantly signal his sexual availability." Young girls who lose their virginity through rape or abuse are sometimes considered "loose" and later revictimized by another family member. The chapter on White Anglo-Saxon Protestants says that victims are often disbelieved because of "denial, isolation, and secrecy" and WASP insistence that "nothing bad ever happens in our family." The WASP tradition of freedom and individualism makes some WASP men believe that satisfying their own needs at the expense of others is a "moral right." And it makes victims feel "responsible for everything that happens to them." Professor Fontes says sexual abuse is tacitly supported by cultures that "idealize innocent female bodies and portray aging female bodies as spoiled or repugnant." But she warns that abuse is found in all U.S. cultures at all social and economic levels. She adds that "every culture has attitudes, beliefs, and practices that seem to put children at risk for sexual abuse, and others that seem to protect them." Sexual Abuse in Nine North American Cultures: Treatment and Prevention is available for $22.95 plus $2 handling charge from Sage Publications, Inc., 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320-2218. NOTE: Dr. Fontes may be reached for interviews at (317) 494-1833.
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