| Feminist multicultural therapy is therapeutic approach that combines principles and practices from multicultural counseling and feminist therapy. Multicultural counseling and feminist therapy were developed in response to increasing recognition that existing therapies repeated, during counseling, oppressive patterns that existed in general society and harmed clients who were members of oppressed groups. Both of these therapeutic approaches include an examination of oppression and the effect it has on clients' well-being. They both share a goal of helping clients be better equipped to recognize and address oppression; to make empowering choices; and, when possible, be active in making changes in society to reduce or eliminate oppression. Increasingly, feminist and multicultural counseling perspectives have informed each other, particularly where gender and racial/ethnic concerns intersect.;Consistent with values that embrace the client as an expert on her or his own experiences, multicultural and feminist counseling research has been conducted to learn the client's perspective on what factors are important to her or him in therapy. This research focused on measuring the impact on counseling of factors such as multicultural competence and feminist attitudes. However, to date, little research has addressed the client's perspective with regard to the definition, the processes, and outcomes of feminist multicultural therapy.;Therefore, this study utilized a Grounded Theory method of data analysis to analyze data from 12 diverse women participants from the western United States. Data consisted of interviews with clients and journal entries written by them about their counseling experiences. Participants were clients who chose to participate after being presented with a flyer about the study by their self-identified feminist multicultural therapists.;Two central themes emerged from the data. Specifically, results revealed that clients experienced a safe therapeutic relationship as the most potent component of feminist multicultural therapy, and they were extremely active in their therapy in several ways. Most important was their constant assessment of their therapy experiences based on their counseling goals and sense of safety within counseling. Six other themes emerged from the data that detail important processes and outcomes of feminist multicultural therapy. Implications for practice, limitations, and future directions for research are discussed. |
