Dr Stephen Hicks

Reader in Social Work

• Allerton C603
• T: 0161 295 2178
• E: s.hicks@salford.ac.uk
• SEEK: Research profile

1. Semester 1: Monday 3.00pm - 5.00pm

2. Semester 2: Tuesday 3.00pm - 5.00pm

3. Or please make an appointment.

Steve is a qualified social worker and has worked in community mental health, child protection social work, HIV/Aids support services, a project for homeless lesbian, gay bisexual and trans young people, and was a founder member of a national support group for lesbian and gay foster carers and adopters. He has been an academic since 1996, and came to Salford in 2002, after working at Manchester University, Manchester Metropolitan University and the University of Central Lancashire.

Steven ran the MSc Child Care and Family Practice (2002-2012), and currently leads an MSc in Comparative Safeguarding. He teaches on the BA Professional Studies Child Care (Post-Qualifying), the MA Social Work, the MSc Comparative Safeguarfing, the Professional Doctorate (Health & Social Care) and the PhD programmes.

Current taching:

• The Practitioner-Researcher (DProf).
• Understanding Social Work Research (MA Social Work, full and part-time).
• Critical Reflexitivity, Policy & Research in Contemporary Child Care (BA Professional Studies Child Care, Post-Qualifying).
• Getting Started Week (PhD programmes).

Steve's main research interest has been lesbian, gay and queer parenting, with a focus on foster care and adoption. He has published widely inb this field, including Lesbian, Gay & Queer Parenting: Families, Intimiacies, Genealogies (2011, Palgrave Macmillanb Studies in Family & Intimate Life series). He has also researched and written about theorizing sexuality in social welfare, masculinities and social work, the links between child maltreatment and child death, practitioner research, and discourse analytic approaches. With Dharman Jeyasingham (Lanchaster Univeristy), Steve is writing a book on The Social Work of Sexuality.

Doctoral student research supervised to date has included:

• child protection systems in UK and Europe.
• men's experiences of domestic abuse.
• transgender people and social welfare services.
• family mediation provision.
• the culture of a radiography department.
• comparisons between hay and hetorosexual domestic abuse.
• the social dynamics of research ethics committees concerned with 'mental capacities'.

Funded research

The Relationship Between Child Death & Child Maltreatment, 2000-2004, National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

Family Placement Literature Bibliography Project, 2003-2005, British Association for Adoption & Fostering.

Supervision of Children's Workforce Development Council Practitioner-Led Research Programme candidate, 2008-2009, CWDC.

The Meaning and Practices of Social Work - Cross-national Comparisons, EU/Aus teaching and research exchange, 2009-2012, European Commission, Industrialised Countries Instrument - Education Cooperation Programme.

Race and Social Work Symposium, 2012, Higher Education Academy.

Academic Qualifications: PhD, MA, BA (Hons.)

Professional Qualifications: DipSW, Cert Counselling.

From 2008 only:

Hicks, S. (2013) ‘Deconstructing the Family’, in C. Cocker & T. Hafford-Letchfield (eds.) Rethinking Anti-Discriminatory Practice: Diversity & Equality in Social Work (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan).

Hicks, S. (2012) ‘Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Trans Parents and the Question of Gender’, in A.E. Goldberg & K.R. Allen (eds.) LGBT-Parent Families: Possibilities for New Research and Implications for Practice (New York: Springer), 149-162.

Hicks, S. (2011) Lesbian, Gay & Queer Parenting: Families, Intimacies, Genealogies (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan).

Hicks, S. (2009) ‘Sexuality’, in R. Adams, L. Dominelli & M. Payne (eds.) Practising Social Work in a Complex World (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan), 70-84.

Hicks, S. (2009) ‘Sexuality and the “Relations of Ruling”: Using institutional ethnography to research lesbian and gay foster care and adoption’, Social Work & Society, 7(2), http://www.socwork.net/2009/2/articles/hicks

Taylor, C. & Hicks, S. (2009) ‘The Practitioner-Researcher: A critical and reflexive approach to professional practice’ (with Carolyn Taylor), in N-J. Lee Achieving Your Professional Doctorate: A handbook (Maidenhead: Open University Press), 50-84.

Hicks, S. (2008) ‘Gender Role Models…who needs ‘em?!’ Qualitative Social Work, 7(1), 43-59.

Hicks, S. (2008) ‘Thinking Through Sexuality’, Journal of Social Work, 8(1), 65-82.

Hicks, S. (2008) ‘What Does Social Work Desire?’ Social Work Education, 27(2), 131-137.

Hicks, S. & Taylor, C. (2008) ‘A Complex Terrain of Words and Deeds: Discourse, research, and social change’ (with Carolyn Taylor), in P. Cox, T. Geisen & R. Green (eds.) Qualitative Research and Social Change: European Contexts (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan), 52-72.