On Page 87 the line: “Settlement work, educational and vocationalguidance.” is missing a corresponding number.
The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
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UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA
ALICE S. CHEYNEY
A THESIS
IN SOCIOLOGY
PRESENTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL IN
PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR
THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
PHILADELPHIA
1923
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COPYRIGHT 1923
BY
ALICE S. CHEYNEY
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| Chapter | Page | |
| I. | WHY THIS DEFINITION IS ATTEMPTED | 5 |
| II. | THE CHARITABLE ELEMENT IN SOCIAL WORK | 8 |
| III. | THE SCIENTIFIC ELEMENT IN SOCIAL WORK | 16 |
| IV. | THE TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF SOCIAL WORK | 27 |
| V. | THE TESTIMONY OF THE TRAINING SCHOOLS FOR PROFESSIONAL SOCIAL WORKERS | 47 |
| VI. | THE ANSWER TO ITS CRITICS | 55 |
| APPENDIX | 81 | |
| BIBLIOGRAPHY | 89 | |
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What social worker has not been asked to define socialwork and found himself at a loss? It is easy to describe hisown particular tasks but it is not easy to characterize theprofession as a whole or to say why its very diverse phasesare identified with one another. Why should we apply theterm “social work” to hospital social service and probation,but not to nursing and interpreting, services which seemto stand in a similar relation to medicine and the courts?
Definitions of social work are not yet to be found in dictionariesor encyclopedias. A certain amount of characterizationappears in current literature, by implication or bymention of one feature here and another there. Some generaldescriptions say of it things which, though true, do not distinguishit.[1] Probably no strict definition is possible. Thefield of soc