Expired Narrative Therapy with Children and Adolescents

Early on in the history of a narrative approach, Michael White worked with young children by “externalizing” the problem. We appreciate that narrative therapy is much more than externalizing; it is about understanding that the problem, rather than being located in the person or the system or the relationship, comes from a larger cultural discourse.

This online workshop will focus on work with children and adolescents, using externalizing as a practice while noticing how the culture influences both children and their parents. Children and adolescents, rather than being the authors of their own story, are the protagonists in stories their parents have authored. What children are experiencing is constructed as problematic, rather than being seen as something that makes sense. Therapy becomes about assisting children and their families to shift the narrator from the parents to the children, so that they can become agents of change in their own behalf.

In this workshop, the presenter will show two videos: one with a six-year-old girl, with “worries;” and the other with a 15-year-old girl with “anger.” Through the use of the videos, the presenter will assist participants in how they might work with their own young clients.

Learning Objectives:

  • Understand that externalizing is a practice that locates the problem in cultural discourse.
  • Appreciate several different discourses that tend to operate on families with children and adolescents.
  • Learn skills that are appropriate for working with young children, adolescents, and their families.
  • Gain a better understanding of the narrative approach.

Presenter:

Victoria C. Dickerson, Ph.D., is clinician in private practice. She is recent past-president of the American Family Therapy Academy. Dr. Dickerson is also the social media/communications strategist for the Family Process Institute and organizer/moderator of a series of webinars co-sponsored by the Family Process Institute and the Ackerman Institute for the Family. she is a recipient of the Lifetime Achievement award from the American Family Therapy Academy. Her publications include: articles in Family Process; two books; an edited Springer Brief; and several book chapters, all on narrative-poststructural ideas and practices.

  • April 13, 2018
    10:00 am - 4:00 pm

Victoria C. Dickerson, PhD

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