Family Therapy Conference Research Articles

Adventures in time, gender and therapeutic practice. Embracing a queer systemic way of working with gender expansive families

This paper is an adaption of a keynote address delivered at the Association of Family Therapy Conference 2022. Gender attracts our attention. The reference points for this living and lived concept are changing as people inhabit new truths and reclaim ancient wisdoms of gender. Therapists face the challenge of holding multiple and heart-felt truths about what gender can be in the context of increasingly polarised views of what gender should be. In this paper, I examine how binary gender, created by pathologising colonial practices restricts the psychotherapeutic imagination of what gender and sexuality can be. I encourage practitioners to leave what Hare-Mustin calls the mirrored room (1994) in which dominant socio-political discourses limit possibilities. I discuss how installing a mirror ball, a symbol of queer joy and celebration, in practice spaces would create a fracturing and queering of discourses reflecting wider lived experiences, communities and language practices.

Challenging Essentialist Anti-Oppressive Discourse: Uniting Against Racism and Sexism

Challenging Essentialist Anti-Oppressive Discourse: Uniting Against Racism and Sexism

An account of family therapy in Aotearoa New Zealand from the 1960s to 1995 interpreted from the literature.

This description of family therapy in Aotearoa New Zealand from the 1960s to 1995 is the author’s interpretation of published literature. It traces the early influence of psychological medicine, social workers and overseas experts, leading to the spread of regional interest groups, national and binational conferences, and mounting sociopolitical pressure on family therapy from feminism, cultural justice and antipoverty movements during the 1980s. Several landmark publications and events in the period 1990–1995 reflect the growing stature and bright future of family therapy in New Zealand before controversy at the Third Joint Australia and New Zealand Family Therapy conference in Wellington during 1995 appears to catalyse a stalling of further national or binational development for over a decade. Critical research on the period 1990–1995 is proposed to explore what lessons the past may hold for the future development of family therapy in New Zealand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of New Zealand Journal of Counselling is the property of New Zealand Association of Counsellors and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Ethical Practice and Narratives of Resistance to Violence: Becoming Resilient Part 2

This paper is the second part of a previous publication in this journal and is based on a plenary address at the 30th Australian Family Therapy Conference in 2009. It develops the idea of ethical practice in therapy for men and boys with a history of significant violence and abuse. This fosters a connection with resilience that resists or refuses to participate in historical narratives that support violence and its effects. In the paper, I provide several therapeutic examples of working with narratives of violence and present a theory of resilience and ethical practice drawing on the ideas of Deleuze. This helps to understand resilience as a process of ethical agency, creative renewal, and the production of expansive difference.

Family Therapy in France: An Australian Perspective

This article is an exploration of family therapy in France by an Australian social worker and family therapist. It also reports on the 2010 European Family Therapy Conference and includes an interview with Dr Mony Elkaïm that provides an overview of his work. All this is discussed in terms of its relevance for family therapists in Australia. It is followed by a brief response from Dr Elkaïm.

Becoming Resilient: Overturning Common Sense — Part 1

How might we engage with the concept resilience in a world obsessed with the measurement and cataloguing of deficits and virtues alike; with predicting outcomes, producing certainty and the reification of stable identity? This article is based on a plenary address presented to the Australian Family Therapy Conference in 2009 and takes Deleuze's paraphrase of the 17th century philosopher, Spinoza as a point of departure from common sense views of identity. Can resilience be possessed by some as a personal quality enhancing their coping skills or might resilience be a vital aspect of living which passes through us? Perhaps resilience bounces back towards us and enables the unsettling of dogmatic beliefs and a stable sense of identity Enquiry might then shift from the moral; What kind of person am I? How should I live? towards an ethical position of wonder; What else might there be? What might I be capable of?This article invites an ethical exploration of desire, its capture and of resistance and explores the politics of identity; illustrated with men's journeys of struggle with violence, sexuality and belonging and the discovery of ethics and generous forms of love in the face of adversity.

The Hypothesis as Dialogue: An Interview With Paolo Bertrando

The following interview was conducted during the 29th Australian Family Therapy Conference, September 29 to October 3, 2008, at The University of Queensland, Australia. Paolo Bertrando, psychiatrist and systemic psychotherapist, was trained in Milan by Gianfranco Ceechin and Lugi Boscolo, with whom he collaborated in the 1990s. His present interests concern the dynamics of systemic therapy, the use of systemic therapy with individuals and the relevance of emotions for systemic practice. Michael Locke works as a consultant in practice development and service delivery systems at Centacare Catholic Family and Community Services, Brisbane. He has worked in both public and community based agencies utilising both systemic and brief therapy orientations with individuals, couples and families.

‘Strategies, Secrets and Safety’: The Hobart Conference — A Personal Reflection

The 28th Australian Family Therapy Conference was held in Hobart, Tasmania at the Hobart Function and Conference Centre right in the heart of Elizabeth Street Pier. The themes of this year's conference were 'Strategies, Secrets and Safety'.

Australian Family Therapy: Have We Lived Up To Our Mission Statement?

In 1983 the Fourth Australian Family Therapy Conference had the theme ‘Merging the Streams — Integrating Trends in Family Therapy’. In his keynote address Brian Stagoll outlined concerns regarding the nature of family therapy as it was then developing in Australia. This article revisits some of these themes to see where we have come from, where we are heading and which topics continue to be ignored. Evidence is drawn from articles that stood out for me in the Australian Journal of Family Therapy (later the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy) and selected relevant papers from the 1983 conference itself. Finally, I speculate upon possible reasons for the absence of discussion on certain issues, most strikingly: systemic influences upon indigenous Australians, farm families, working with children in families, certain aspects of gender, the systemic implications of addiction; and environmental impacts on families now and for the future. The danger for family therapy is becoming stuck in a closed system that ignores the wider system.

Review of the 25th Annual Family Therapy Conference Brisbane: ‘Getting it Together: Family Therapy Practice for the Future’

Review of the 25th Annual Family Therapy Conference Brisbane: ‘Getting it Together: Family Therapy Practice for the Future’

Reflections on an International Conference: Istanbul, Turkey

This article reflects the author’s experience of the 2004 World Family Therapy Conference in Istanbul, Turkey. The conference theme, Families in a Time of Global Crisis, was linked to global issues. Sessions by professionals from various countries are reviewed by the author, including overviews of a Turkish women’s group for vaginismus, implementation of a counselor education program in northern Iraq, and details of a support group for survivors of terrorism in Israel. The author’s observations of audience participation are also included.

24th Australian Family Therapy Conference, Adelaide 2004: The Conference that Dared to be Different!

24th Australian Family Therapy Conference, Adelaide 2004: The Conference that Dared to be Different!

The way we were in 1983; Le Tour de Moonee Ponds Family Health Centre (by Appointment to the Queen)

In this paper, originally presented at the Sydney Family Therapy Conference in 1983, the author satirised the state of family therapy in Australia at the time, with its awe of overseas gurus, and in so doing mirrored some of our distinctive contributions to world culture. In her epilogue, the author briefly describes subsequent life events which have made her, twenty years later, a very different person, and a very different therapist as well.

Living up to Our Theory: Inviting Children to Family Sessions

This paper was a response to an invitation to present a plenary address to the 2002 Family Therapy Conference with its theme of 'Transitions and Traditions'. It reflects on the recurrent pattern of failure to embrace children as clients and explores the basis of this. The paper aims to identify possible solutions and raises the challenge of whether this field is prepared for such a transition. (author abstract)

‘Let's Live, and See’: Interview with Moshe Talmon

Moshe Talmon, author of Single Session Therapy and Single Session Solutions, spoke to Lil Cox, family therapist from Oakrise Child & Adolescent Mental Health Service at Launceston, when she caught up with him at the Inaugural Pan‐Pacific Family Therapy Conference in Melbourne, Australia in September 2001. He spoke about his early life, training, his research showing that clients can get what they need from one session, and his current approach to therapy. Finally, he gives his reasons for continuing to live and work in Israel.

23rd Family Therapy Conference; A Student's Perspective

Greetings! I am a family worker in regional Victoria, and a post grad student in Family Centred Practice. Being relatively new to the field I was pleasantly surprised to be asked to review the 23rd Family Therapy Conference, Hobart 2002. This was my first Family Therapy conference, and these are my impressions.

Coming out of the Shed: Reflections on Men and Fathers

This paper is based upon a keynote address I delivered to the 2000 Australian Family Therapy Conference. The address invited conference participants to reflect on the functional or ‘provider’ roles so often assigned to men as partners and fathers. I link socio‐historical observations about the construction of gender‐based roles, with personal experiences of three generations of men from my own family of origin. I suggest that a continuing division of roles along gendered lines is not serving men well. Nor does it offer many benefits to men's female partners or their children. Practices within family law provide one illustration of persistent gender‐laden attitudes that, in the light of solid experimental evidence on men and fathering over the past twenty years, need to be challenged. Therapists, too, are challenged to reflect on how to engage men in ways that avoid the reinforcement of gender stereotypes.

The fifth Holocaust Dialogue Interactive Group session: lessons to be learned.

This article describes the fifth Holocaust Dialogue Group meeting between descendants of both victims and perpetrators. This process began in 1994 and has continued into 1999. It is held in conjunction with the annual International Association of Family Therapy Conference. Those in attendance report that this process has facilitated their catharsis regarding long-repressed issues and feelings of shame and guilt, enabled them to ask probing questions of relatives, and contributed to a profoundly desired healing. Repetitive themes that have emerged in the sessions are highlighted.

GRIEF THERAPY: AN EXPERIENTIAL WORKSHOP*

The authors conducted a workshop at a family therapy conference in South Africa in 1997 to explore the use of healing rituals in grief work. There were two levels involved: First, an experiential workshop, and, second, a metalevel in exploring the use of rituals as a rite of passage to facilitate transitions. A draft of the authors' paper was sent to all participants for their comments, which are included in the text.

Interview with Andrew Samuels

Andrew Samuels is Professor of Analytical Psychology at the University of Essex, Visiting Professor of Psychoanalytic Studies at Goldsmith's College, University of London and a Jungian Analyst in London. We were lucky to have Andrew participate very generously in the Brisbane Family Therapy Conference in September, 1998. Andrew has written widely on psychological and psychotherapeutic themes, and has opened up new areas around the relations between therapy and politics. In his book The Political Psyche (1993) he poses the questions:Is there a special psychology of and for politics and culture? If so, what does the clinical practice of analysis and therapy with individuals or small groups contribute to the forming of such a psychology? ... In what way is the personal political—and in what way is the political personal?We interviewed Andrew in Brisbane just one week before the 1998 Federal Election, with talk of Howard, Beazley and Hanson pervading conference conversations. It was a great time to have Andrew around. But first we had to clear up a few matters about Jung.