
BSW Hons. Cl1 (UNSW) MSW (U. of Calgary)M.Litt Gender Studies (U. of Sydney)
Kerrie James is a Lecturer of Social Work at the School of Social Sciences, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, UNSW. She is the Coordinator of the Master of Social Work (Counselling) program.
Kerrie's research is about domestic violence, trauma, refugees and family therapy. She is currently working on a project exploring the capacity of counselling organsiations to assess and manage potential lethality in domestic violence situations. She is completing a project which looked at the extent to which domestic violence occurs in natural disasters. She has also published on working with refugees in urban environments and on conceptualising therapist’s skills in couple and family therapy. Her recent work also explored issues in teaching social work students about trauma and training refugee lay counsellors in India.
In 1999, Kerrie received the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy Award for Distinguished Contributions to Australian Family Therapy. Prior to joining the University in 2005, Kerrie was the Clinical Director at Relationships Australia NSW.
Research Areas
Domestic violence: differences in men's versus women's violence, men's experience of their own violence (ARC Industry Award in 1996); issues of forgiveness and responsibility in family violence; domestic violence and refugees; prevention of lethality in domestic violence for counselling organisations; domestic violence in natural disasters; counselling training in refugee contexts.
Current Research Projects
Postgraduate Research Supervision
Areas of Supervision
Workplace education; family therapy in adolescent mental health; refugee women and 'survival sex', clergy sexual abuse.
Current Postgraduate Research Supervision Topics
Teaching
Teaching areas
Kerrie is the program convenor for the Masters of Counselling Social Work, coordinating and teaching in the six courses that comprise this degree. Kerrie also teaches students in the Masters of Couple and Family Therapy and in the Batchelor of Social Work program.
Current teaching
SOCW2003 Working with Individuals, Families and Groups 1
SOCW3002 Working with Individuals, Families and Groups 2
SOCW3008 Therapeutic and Community Responses to Trauma
SOCF5101 Relational Contexts of Practice
SOCF5102 Selected Practice Frameworks
SOCF5004 Contemporary Theory Issues
SOCF5006 Clinical studies C
Affiliation and Memberships
Other Information
Reviewer for the following journals: International Journal of Feminist Family Therapy, Journal of Family Therapy, and Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy
Reviewer for the following journals:
International Journal of Feminist Family Therapy
Journal of Family Therapy
Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy.
Intervention: Journal of Menatl Health and Psycho-social Support in Conflict Affected Areas.
My Teaching
Post Graduate – Convenes the Masters of Counselling Social Work. Coordinates and teaches in five of the six courses that comprise this degree.