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NewSocialWorker
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March 27, 2005
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Reviewer's Comments:
Summary:
speaks loudly to women
Updike Davis, M. (2002). Ties Across Time: A Woman’s Life in Social Work. Creative Arts Book Company, Berkeley, California. 184 pages, $14.95.
Reviewed for THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER by Deneece Ferales
Merle Updike Davis has written an autobiography that invites the reader to relive with her both her personal and professional joys and struggles as she details her life as a social worker. Ms. Updike Davis gives an honest account of her professional work, including the effects this had on her personal life. She discusses her life in a chronological order, which also gives the reader a vivid historical picture and an historical account of the development of social work through the eyes of someone who lived it. Throughout the book, Ms. Updike Davis details her struggles as an early feminist, faced with the challenges of having a career and wanting to marry and have a family in a society that did not yet welcome feminism.
The author begins by discussing her childhood in Fauquier County, Virginia. She discusses her relationship with her parents, family friends, extended relatives, and schoolmates. She paints a vivid, historical picture of the time period. She presents the attitudes of her family, particularly her mother, and how these attitudes led to her commitment to social justice and her feminist nature.
Ms. Updike Davis details her college days, including her relationships with roommates and male friends. Her initial interest was not in social work, but she was pursued for employment by the local welfare agency. From her job experience and from working closely with her mentor, she began to gain an interest in social work, particularly child welfare. As the author discusses each of her jobs, she gives case examples to help the reader understand her clientele and how her own personality was shaped by her work.
Ms. Updike Davis received a scholarship through her work in child welfare to attend graduate school, first at Washington University in St. Louis, then completing her education at Columbia University. The author states that she trained to be a psychiatric social worker and sought a job in this area. This led her to move to San Francisco, to work in a psychiatric hospital, and then to Berkeley, to work in a community mental health clinic, a bold move for a woman who had always lived on the East Coast. Ms. Updike Davis bought a house in Berkeley and finally married.
Ms. Updike Davis’ career led her to be one of the pioneers of the community mental health movement in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Through this work, the author participated in community organizing and political activism. Ms. Updike Davis continued her work in community mental health until the late ’70s, when she retired.
At this time, she began her private practice, which she kept for almost 20 years. She specialized in seeing elderly patients, although she also saw adolescents and families. The variety of training that she had received throughout her career, from the training in community organization and psychiatric social work she received in graduate school to a training that she and other colleagues attended with Virginia Satir in family therapy, served her well in dealing with the diverse clientele that sought her services as a private practitioner.
Ms. Updike Davis ends the book by taking a candid inventory of her life as a social worker. She attributes her success in social work to her mentors along the way, but credits her own experience with psychoanalysis as having the most impact on her social work career.
I would highly recommend this book to new social workers. The historical perspective of the profession and the detailed description of the evolution of social work methods as told by someone who lived through this evolution aids the new social worker in developing a better understanding of the profession, as well as helping to develop a deep sense of pride in the social work heritage. Ms. Updike Davis’ career also challenges the new social worker to take advantage of career opportunities, as she is the true picture of a generalist practitioner, from welfare worker to psychiatric social worker, to administrator, to community organizer, and finally to private practice.
Not-so-new social workers will also enjoy this book, as one can relate to the author’s struggles in the profession and personal struggles that accompany when social work is one’s chosen profession.
Finally, I think this book speaks loudly to women, particularly those concerned with feminist issues. The author’s struggle as a woman who wanted to have a career and her candor about how this affected her personal life strikes a chord for both early and contemporary feminists. Her ability to maintain balance in her life and find happiness in both her person and her career is nothing short of inspirational.
Reviewed by Deneece Ferrales, LMSW-ACP, ABD, Assistant Professor and Interim BSW Program Director, Worden School of Social Service, Our Lady of the Lake University, San Antonio, TX.
This review appeared in the Winter 2003 issue of THE NEW SOCIAL WORKER magazine.
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