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Ruth De Souza

Facilitating Conversations in Cultural Safety, Health, and the Arts

Dr. Ruth De Souza is a facilitator, consultant, keynote speaker, writer, podcaster, and researcher, with professional expertise across the health and arts sectors. Ruth’s work focuses on cultural safety, maternity, migration and health, equity and inclusion, self-care, mental health and digital health. Ruth is a Fellow of the Australian College of Nursing, an Honorary Adjunct Professor in Nursing at Auckland University of Technology, and lectures in the School of Art at RMIT University.

Facilitation

Ruth brings decades of experience as an educator, group therapist, facilitator, and consultant, supporting environments of liberation, creativity, and inquiry. Ruth uses methods that support inventive and unique conversations and collective decision-making. She helps people through discomfort by connecting to their dignity and humanity, and using the knowledge and feelings in the room to help to activate pathways to action. Ruth is a trained therapist, skilled at communication, building connections and generating collective energy and skills that enable respectful collaboration and navigation though conflict.

Consulting

Ruth brings her expertise and strategic insight to organisations through her consulting and organisational development practice. Specialising in co-designed evaluation and planning activities toward cultural safety, equity and inclusion, Ruth assists organisations to build flexibility and resilience to navigate uncertain futures in a time of far-reaching global change. Ruth has held a number of governance roles and ministerial appointments, and her wide ranging experience in service co-design integrates broad knowledge of high-level organisation with the nuts and bolts experience as a clinician and practitioner in a wide range of contexts.

Mentoring & Coaching

Ruth is deeply embedded in contemporary leadership practices and is an experienced coach and mentor, both in one-to-one settings and as part of mentoring programs. Ruth helps leaders and emerging leaders to connect to their sense of purpose and find authentic pathways to navigate complex issues and problems, bringing clarity, motivation and inspiration.

Keynote Speaker & MC

Ruth’s work as a public speaker and podcaster makes complex cultural issues understandable and relevant to diverse communities. Ruth brings authenticity, presence and warmth to the room, combining her passion for social justice and inclusion with wide ranging expertise. Ruth’s talks inspire and motivate audiences and leave a genuine and lasting impact. With her broad experience, Ruth is able to connect to specialist audiences across the health, arts and cultural fields as well as the general public.

Podcast

Birthing and Justice with Dr Ruth De Souza

Childbirth is supposed to be empowering, but for many birthing people, it is not. For Indigenous women, immigrant women, and women of colour, birthing within the western healthcare system can be anything but affirming. It can feel unsafe. In this raw and challenging talks series, I host conversations about birth, racism, and cultural safety with changemakers working within the birthing sector to break down the structures built on colonisation.

Click here to visit the Podcast page.

From the Blog

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Review: Australian mental health nurses and transgender clients: Attitudes and knowledge

This is a longer version of a review of Damien Riggs & Clare Bartholomaeus’ paper published in the Journal of Research in Nursing: Australian mental health nurses and transgender clients: Attitudes and knowledge. Cite as: De Souza, R. (2016). Review: Australian mental health nurses and transgender clients: Attitudes and knowledge. Journal of Research in Nursing, 0(0) […]

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All I want for Christmas is… On International Day of Solidarity with Migrants 2015

December 18th marks the anniversary of the signing of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families by the United Nations in 1990. Lobbying from Filipino and other Asian migrant organisations in 1997, led to December18th being promoted as an International Day of Solidarity with Migrants. The day […]

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Medical pluralism: Supporting co-existing diverse therapeutic traditions in mental health

This was first published in the Spring 2015 edition (Issue 41) of the Federation of Ethnic Councils of Australia (FECCA) national magazine, Australian Mosaic. Cite as: DeSouza, R. (2015). Medical pluralism: Supporting co-existing diverse therapeutic traditions in mental health. Australian Mosaic (FECCA). 41, 34-36. Decades afterward, I still recall the frequent waking, getting out of bed and […]

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Testimonials

Ruth was wonderful to work with – responsive, highly experienced, and understood our organisational context very well. Her workshop was very engaging and appropriately challenging. I’d have no hesitation in inviting her back!

The team absolutely loved Ruth’s work and ability to engage with all disciplines and different knowledge levels.