Renegotiating social order in multicultural groups

Based on the assumption that in all therapy and encounter groups there is a lso a struggle for personal recognition the author makes the thesis that in groups of multicultural/multi-ethnic composition it is possible to see how the personal selfworth reflects on a social order and the own respected pl ace therein. Group members from different social orders (cultures) are conf ronted with the task to newly determine the significance/importance valence of such basic dimensions like gender, social category, religious imprint e tc, in there concrete forms. This takes place in the context of relative po wer imbalance between majority culture and minority culture which tend to d evalue each other. The more violent the history of the existing stereotypes was the more this becomes a problem in the group process. For the German c ontext this block is made by the Holocaust which becomes perceptible as dis sociation. The degree of this dissolution is the limit how far the,normal p rocess' of exchange of different capital like intelligence, beauty, social- economical status, education etc, can take place, in which each member seek s to be confirmed in his or her value and they all together make up the con crete version of a common social order in the group. Besides Bourdieu these thoughts are based mainly on Elias, Benjamin and Rommelspacher.