Supporting communication through culturally responsive practice: Keynote presentation and workshop

Every person has the right to be supported to communicate effectively in all of the language they speak. Despite this, historically the speech-language pathology has provided support in the dominant language of society (i.e., English). However, a large body of research demonstrates that multilingual competence has social, emotional, educational and economic advantages for both individuals and societies. For speech-language pathologists (SLPs), the task of providing evidence-based assessment and intervention is seemingly more complex when their clients are from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. As a result, research shows that SLPs are less confident in their ability to support the communication of people from multilingual and multicultural backgrounds.
To further add to the complexity of this field of practice, it is known that people from non-dominant language and cultural backgrounds are less likely to access health services. This can be due to differences between professionals’ and families’ cultural approaches to communication, health, disability, and child rearing. It can also be due to families’ lack of awareness of the positive impact that speech-language pathology services can have upon a person’s participation in society, education and the workforce. The Principles of Culturally Responsive Practice provides a guiding framework for professionals to identify and address potential barriers to enhance families’ engagement in, and experience of, services to support communication outcomes, both immediately and in the long-term. This workshop will unpack these Principles and apply them to real world settings to optimise effective, culturally responsive practice with increasingly diverse caseloads.