2026/08/07 by Isabel S. Lee
paper · doi:10.1177/08861099261475314
published in Affilia (SAGE Publications)
This conceptual paper examines how feminist social work pedagogy, integrated with Critical Feminist Narrative Analysis (CFNA) and Situation Analysis (SA), supports the development of structural analytic capacity in social work education. Through a comparative narrative analysis of two women-centered texts, The Help (Jim Crow Mississippi) and Pachinko (Japanese colonialism and Korean diaspora), the paper examines how intersecting forms of oppression are structured and experienced across distinct historical, cultural, and geopolitical contexts. CFNA interprets how women's experiences are narrated through dynamics of voice, representation, and positionality, while SA, informed by Fullilove's (2004) concept of root shock, examines oppression as a lived environment shaped by relational, spatial, and structural conditions. Across both narratives, recurring patterns emerge, including relational disruption, environmental instability, and conditional belonging, alongside everyday forms of resistance. Building on these insights, the paper proposes a scaffolded pedagogical framework that guides learners from narrative engagement toward structural diagnosis, bridging micro-level experiences with macro-level systems of power and reframing cultural responsiveness as an outcome of structural analytic capacity rather than a discrete competency. This approach supports more nuanced, contextually grounded, and socially just practice in increasingly transnational settings.