Exploring Multicultural Therapies

He who allows oppression, shares the crime. -Erasmus Darwin

1. Any therapeutic approach (e.g., cognitive, gestalt, existential) can be multicultural in orientation if the therapist makes some shifts in thinking. What kinds of changes would be made?

2. What are the relative roles of individual and society from the viewpoint of a multiculturally informed therapy? Why?

3. Different cultural perspectives emphasize some values at the expense of others. What values does your emphasize? How does this differ from that of other cultures?

4. Compare and contrast universal and focused approaches to multicultural therapies. What are the advantages and disadvantages of each approach?

5. Think about Jackson's description of the development of a black identity (as well as the other parallel descriptions included). How do these match what you hear in the Building Bridges discussion or your discussions with friends and relatives? What are the implications of a client's stage for work in therapy?

6. What things does a feminist therapist believe about the genesis of client problems? How might she intervene as a result?

7. What stance does a feminist therapist (such as Walker) take in therapy? How might she relate to a client? What things would she emphasize? de-emphasize? Why?

   Major Marketing Mistakes...

   Coors translated its slogan, "Turn it loose," into Spanish, where it was read as "Suffer from diarrhea."

   Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."

   Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick," a curling iron, into German only to find out that "mist" is slang for manure. Not too many people had use for the "manure stick."

   When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same packaging as in the US, with the beautiful Caucasian baby on the label. Later they learned that, in Africa, companies routinely put pictures on the label of what's inside since most people can't read.

   Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a notorious pornography magazine.

   An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the Pope" (el Papa), the shirts read "I saw the potato" (la papa).

   Pepsi's "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave," in Chinese.

   Frank Perdue's chicken slogan, "it takes a strong man to make a tender chicken" was translated into Spanish as "it takes an aroused man to make a chicken affectionate".

   The Coca-Cola name in China was first read as "Ke-kou-ke-la", meaning "Bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax", depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 characters to find a phonetic equivalent "ko-kou-ko-le", translating into "happiness in the mouth."

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