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Book Details
Abstract
Ideas drawn from family and systemic therapy form the basis of many interventions in mental health and childcare. This brief introduction offers an ideal starting-point for non specialists and new students keen to develop their skills. Taking a step-by-step experiential approach, it explores key concepts in vivid practice context.
JOHN HILLS is Vice Chair of the Association for Family Therapy and British correspondent of the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy. Previously he has been Editor of the Association for Family Therapy Newsletter (1986-1988) and Founding and General Editor of Context, the news magazine of family therapy in Britain. He has been teaching and supervising in the field of systemic and family therapy for well over twenty years and regularly presents at Association for Family Therapy conferences.
Table of Contents
| Section Title | Page | Action | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cover | Cover | ||
| Contents | vii | ||
| Acknowledgements | x | ||
| Introduction | 1 | ||
| The background to the book | 1 | ||
| Our experiential world of interlinking systems | 4 | ||
| An extraordinary creation: the ecology of existence | 6 | ||
| The organisation of the book | 8 | ||
| 1 Using the Genogram and Convening the Family | 10 | ||
| The 'Catch-22' of not working with families | 10 | ||
| Exercise: Constructing your genogram | 13 | ||
| Convening a family meeting | 14 | ||
| The first meeting: setting the scene | 16 | ||
| The genogram | 18 | ||
| Key ideas to hold in mind and watch out for | 20 | ||
| Summary | 25 | ||
| 2 A Family Session Observed | 26 | ||
| Team working in the reflective process | 26 | ||
| Stage one: preparing heart and mind to engage the family | 29 | ||
| Empathic sensibility: its importance and its struggles | 32 | ||
| Stage two: the family arrives | 34 | ||
| Reflections from other systemic approaches | 43 | ||
| Summary | 46 | ||
| 3 Essential Ideas in Systemic Thought and Practice | 47 | ||
| The gentle pervasion of systemic thinking | 47 | ||
| A critical time? | 48 | ||
| The development of systemic thought | 49 | ||
| Structure, function and process in systemic thought | 51 | ||
| Systemic phenomenology and collaborative practice | 53 | ||
| Systems thinking and spirituality | 55 | ||
| Power structure and alliances | 59 | ||
| Cognition and thinking: conception, perception | 60 | ||
| Affect and mood | 62 | ||
| Behaviour/action | 63 | ||
| The difference of difference: cultural issues | 64 | ||
| Existential and life cycle themes | 66 | ||
| Communication | 67 | ||
| Summary | 68 | ||
| 4 The Family Crucible and the Origins of Family Therapy | 70 | ||
| The 'family' as community: what and whom? | 70 | ||
| The family: the basic community of care | 74 | ||
| What is the family crucible? | 75 | ||
| The existential dimension of human existence | 77 | ||
| The origins of family group therapy | 79 | ||
| Summary | 86 | ||
| 5 Key Interactions in the Family Crucible | 87 | ||
| Early attachment: the 'call and response' of the family matrix | 87 | ||
| A family's experience of family therapy | 91 | ||
| Structural analysis and alliances | 93 | ||
| The triangulation drama and a warning from the Greeks | 96 | ||
| Distance regulation and the attachment dance | 99 | ||
| Paul's story | 102 | ||
| William's story | 102 | ||
| Summary | 104 | ||
| 6 The Search for Wellbeing: the Ethical Dimension of Systemic Thought | 105 | ||
| The individual or the common good? | 105 | ||
| Human beings: 'political and familial animals'? | 107 | ||
| Philosophical and spiritual views of the good | 108 | ||
| Wellbeing and health: the political dimension | 113 | ||
| An alternative experiential model | 115 | ||
| Virtues and adversities: the Timberlawn research | 118 | ||
| Summary | 120 | ||
| 7 The Phenomenological Perspective and Method | 122 | ||
| The experiential world of self, others and systems | 122 | ||
| The personal phenomenology of the self | 123 | ||
| The dimensions of self experience | 126 | ||
| Dimension of mind | 127 | ||
| Dimension of affect and mood | 129 | ||
| Dimension of action and interaction | 131 | ||
| Dimension of body and soul | 131 | ||
| Using the phenomenological method in dialogue | 132 | ||
| 'I suspend judgement': the epoche | 133 | ||
| The maieutic method: the experiential midwife | 135 | ||
| Dialogue: the systemic phenomenology of multiple voices | 137 | ||
| Summary | 138 | ||
| 8 Dialogue Analysis: Scripts and Subscripts | 139 | ||
| Deconstructing dialogue | 139 | ||
| Practising the circularity of phenomenological enquiry | 142 | ||
| An extract of family dialogue | 147 | ||
| Some guiding principles of script dialogue and commentary | 151 | ||
| Summary 9 Change and the Therapeutic Art of Narrative | 158 | ||
| So when and how is a systemic based approached helpful? | 158 | ||
| The therapist as shaman and 'magical healer' | 160 | ||
| Some core factors in change and influence | 163 | ||
| Anxiety and unpredictability of outcome | 168 | ||
| Written influence: therapeutic letters | 170 | ||
| Summary | 177 | ||
| Appendix: Genograms | 178 | ||
| Glossary of Main Terms | 184 | ||
| References and Recommended Reading | 196 | ||
| Index | 203 |