Resident Guests: Social Workers in Host Settings

Social workers have practiced in diverse host settings since the profession's origins. Host settings—arenas in which social workers practice that are defined and dominated by people who are not social workers—proliferated during the 1980s as key sites of social work with children, workers, families, and terminally ill and older people. Four predictable problems accompany social workers'presence as resident guests within host settings: (1) value discrepancies between hosts and guests; (2) the marginality of social workers' token status; (3) the devaluing of social work as women's work in settings that are predominantly male in inspiration and composition; and (4) role ambiguity and role strain within the cluster of roles that social workers enact as resident guests. Social workers in host settings must engage in advocacy and collaboration, form working alliances with diverse others, and mobilize resources and influence.