The book provides a much needed fresh and radical perspective of the professional role, identifying novel and innovative interpretations of and trajectories for practice.
Breaking away from ideas mostly framed by academics and/or those with relatively limited practice focus, with contributions from a diverse group of ‘chalk face’ workers as well as references to authentic practice situations, Belton reorients youth work to respond to the actual experience of young people and those working for their interests and growth.
Rejecting deficit models as part of the hangover from the roots of modern exploitation, Belton offers an anti-colonial model of practice that understands youth work as a ‘guerrilla profession’. Calling on the likes of Che Guevara and confronting ‘surveillance society’, Developing Critical Youth Work Theory is an exciting, informative and above all an inspiring read for anyone working with, alongside or for young people.
Dr Brian Belton is a Senior Lecture at the YMCA George Williams College in London, the largest trainer of professional youth and community workers in the world. Brian has taught and practiced youth work all over the planet, from East London to Shanghai, from the Falkland Islands to Toronto for more than thirty years. An international authority on Roma, Gypsy and Traveller ethnicity and popular sporting culture, he is a prolific writer of more than 30 books and in Developing Critical Youth Work Theory he has produced a work, aimed at professionals, working and/or in training, who are involved with young people in the local community context.