Art Therapy in Asia – An interview with Debra Kalmanowitz, Jordan Potash and Siu Mei Chan

“We hope that the readers will be able to read this book and reconsider their own work, no matter where they work. Although globalisation is often thought of as damaging to local culture, the spread of information gives us all ways to learn from each other. Considering the benefits of meditation, holistic health and collectivist values as they apply to art therapy provides an angle that is not reflected in other literature. Instead of looking for a new series of techniques or interventions, we hope that readers will discover fundamentally new ways of conceptualising both their work and how they work.”

April 29, 2012Arts therapies

How to use Dramatic Play to teach kids to ‘learn by doing’ – An interview with Carol Woodard and Carri Milch

Encouraging imaginative play in the classroom is an effective way to teach young children how to think creatively and interact socially – vital parts of…

April 25, 2012Arts therapies

Psychodrama and constellation work remind us of the value of groups

“Connection is not based on identification with others’ experiences or reciprocal sharing but rather on, assisting others and being assisted by others in the search for answers. We might even say that systemic constellation work is not really a group therapy but rather a therapeutic group experience.”

March 14, 2012November 9, 2017Arts therapies

“Although fatigue may persist, it can go away” – An interview with Lucie Montpetit

“[This] is not a book about disease but about finding solutions according to different ways of gaining back one’s physical, emotional and psychological energy balance. For many, it is also a path towards empowerment and finding a new meaning in daily activities.”

Photo: "Buba" by textile artist Neta Amir

February 21, 2012May 8, 2017Arts therapies

Using Textile Arts and Handcrafts in Therapy with Women – An Interview with Ann Futterman Collier

“Ironically, as my fibre-making skills developed, my clinical skills also developed. I became better at creating relationships and more and more comfortable with using textile as an entryway to connect with women whom I didn’t know. At some point, it became obvious to me that making textiles and clinical psychology didn’t need to be two separate compartments in my life: I realized that I was already integrating the two.”

Illustration from 'A Manual of Dynamic Play Therapy' - a child's monster drawing.

February 19, 2012Arts therapies

Dynamic Play Therapy in Action – An Interview with Dennis McCarthy (Part 3)

” I hope readers will become less afraid of rocking the boat of authority that urges us to make the child talk in adult terms about what the adult world deems important to them. Rather than having children be obedient patients, I want to encourage us to attempt in our work to foster true self-possession, knowing how very hard it is to achieve. I urge us all to fight the tendency to negate emotion, to negate aggression, to negate anything and everything that pulsates with life and therefore stirs things up.”

February 18, 2012Arts therapies

Dynamic Play Therapy, Harnessing the power of collapse and renewal – An Interview with Dennis McCarthy (Part 2)

“With rare exceptions, the academic and professional world doesn’t support a dynamic approach to play therapy (or often the use of play in therapy at all). There is an ever-greater thrust to pathologize the child and the family and this is often where the therapist/therapy stops: diagnosis leads to stasis. This needn’t be so. We can and should have an understanding of what is going on in the child and in their life, but unless we then engage the child in real play, we have not accomplished much. Children need to be allowed to be children and speak their language not ours.”

February 17, 2012May 8, 2017Arts therapies

Helping Things Fall Apart, The Paradox of Play – An Interview with Dennis McCarthy (Part 1)

“The deeper [sand]box, with its capacity for burying and sinking and erupting, fit the overall view I have developed which I call Dynamic Play Therapy. My approach is interactive and encourages and even provokes what I see as contained wildness in the service of healthy ego development and a natural sense of self-regulation. The work and my thinking about it still continue to evolve. Even as I write these words new ideas are surfacing based on sessions this week with several children. … My interest has been to understand how children experience their lives and best speak about them, knowing that their language is fundamentally different than ours as adults. They speak in images just as we dream in images. So I spend my days offering them materials and a safe space in which to speak thus.”

February 13, 2012Arts therapies

Dramatherapy and Family Therapy: Essential Pieces of the Multi-Agency Jigsaw in Education – An Interview with Penny McFarlane and Jenny Harvey

“…historically, the intervention for children with emotional and behavioural difficulties has generally been based on behaviour improvement on a cognitive level rather than looking at the meaning behind the behaviour. For a school to accept that a deeper understanding and interpretation of behavioural difficulties is necessary to meet a child’s needs on a sustainable level is a big leap of faith. Therapy is about change and the capacity to maintain changes, and this book can help allay the fears that prevent schools from embracing this mode of intervention.”

February 5, 2012Arts therapies

My Journal Journey – An Article by Kate Thompson, author of Therapeutic Journal Writing

“I wrote this book because this was a book I would have liked when I was training as a counsellor. At that time I had no idea that you could (‘were allowed to’) use journal writing as a therapeutic medium with clients. But I did know that it worked for me so it seemed natural to want to try. This book would have legitimized my instincts and given me the confidence to do it openly.”