Further discussion of indigenization in social work: A response to Gray and Coates

This article responds to Gray’s (2010) and Gray and Coates’ (2010) responses to A Reflection on Indigenization Discourse in Social Work (Huang and Zhang, 2008), and presents further discussion of indigenization in social work. We indicate that it is an inherent professional requirement for social workers to use different ways to understand local contexts and to do locally relevant research and practice. We extend to address some points of indigenization from the Chinese perspective. The problems with the emphasis on culture in indigenization are also discussed. It is suggested that indigenization is likely to bring harm to social work.