“Where’s your husband?”

This question is asked of me many times and often without any offence or harm intended. Yet it can hit some of us harder than others because of the assumption that underlies it that actually being heterosexual is the norm, the default setting.

We work with people from different cultures all the time. Even within one country there are a variety of subcultures. The UK is not a monoculture where we all watch the same things, do the same activities, eat the same food, have the same values and so on. When we work closely with people who are different from us, being able to approach them respectfully and be experienced by them as respectful is so important.

Today we will be looking at how we can work better with people cross-culturally through an intersectional lens which explicitly acknowledges the experiences of people who are LGBTQIA+, non-monogamous and/or into kink/BDSM. These groups absolutely have their own subcultures as well as being clear examples of how experiences of privilege and oppression are different depending on other personal identities such as race, ethnicity, disability, class and so on.

Aimed primarily at those in helping roles, this workshop has the following learning intentions:

• Explore what we mean by ‘culture’,

• Understand the difference between cultural competence and cultural humilty,

• Identify the importance of cultural humility,

• Understand the concepts of privilege and oppression,

• Explore our own identities as a foundation for working cross-culturally,

• Develop skills for discussing privilege and oppression,

• Acknowledging the impact of shame on our ability to work cross-culturally.