Events

Group Analytic Society Events

Can Group Psychotherapy Survive NICE?

Examining the Evidence

29th January 2010

120 Belsize Lane, London

Workshop Flyer

Foulkes Lecture 2010

THE ISLANDS OF THE BLEST

Group Analysts and their Groups

14th May 2010

Brunai Gallery, London

Speaker: Jane Campbell

Respondent: Sue Einhorn

In Greek mythology these islands were peopled by mortals favoured by the gods and thus released from the depredations of labour and of time: “happy heroes for whom the grain-giving field bears honey-sweet fruit”.

In war-torn Europe Foulkes developed his ideas for a therapy whose underlying philosophy was one of freedom. Within their protective boundaries, group-analytic groups were to be free of structured time, with no agenda, no set task, no expectation of ‘closure’ or ‘understanding’, no goal of adjustment or socialization. Distancing himself from the medical model based on “normality, illness and cure” he offered a setting within which the creative function of the therapist would enable group members “to become themselves, to lead a fuller life, to make use of happiness and to avoid adding too much further suffering to their miseries”.

Can this language make sense to group analysts working within the task-focussed, evidence-based, time-limited, treatment-oriented, closely monitored psychological therapies of our time?

If Group Analysis is both an art and a science and if it is more than merely a technique and since Group Analysis embraces many languages, which will in turn determine not only what group analysts think and do, but what they look for and what they find, we may need to ask, as we place today’s heroes in our groups, whether the language that Foulkes used still has any meaning or relevance today.

Other Events

Sites of Conflict: Psycho-Political Resistance in Israel-Palestine

15th & 16th October 2009

Organised by Psychosocial Studies & Birkbeck Institute for Social Research

This conference, the first of its kind in the UK, addresses the remarkable projects of certain groups working in Gaza, Israel and the West Bank involved in joint resistance to ongoing military conflict and occupation. Working for mental health and human rights on the front lines involving military aggression, internal group violence, systemic interference with basic human rights, brutalization on many fronts and deep pessimism on all sides, speakers will address any and all resources for combined resistance and shared hope, whether close to home or coming from abroad. The recent catastrophic attack on the civilian population of Gaza, at the eye of the storm of sites of conflict in Western eyes, makes this event both critical and significant.

Themes:

*Survival and Non-Violent Resistance in Gaza and the West Bank

*Psychoactive Political Resistance in Israel.

*Possibilities and Limitations of Therapeutic Approaches to Conflict Resolution.

*The Politics of Apology and other forms of Acknowledgement

*Denial in the Face of Atrocity

*Mental Attrition of Activists

* Diasporic and all other forms of Support for Peace from Afar.

Speakers:

Mohamed Altawil; Nissim Avissar; Jessica Benjamin; Tova Buksbaum; Bea Campbell; Stan Cohen; Yasmeen Daher; Stephen Frosh; Uri Hadar; Seamas Heaney; Maureen Hetherington; Samah Jabr; Ghada Karmi; Keith Kahn‐Harris; Adah Kay; Yehudit Keshet; Richard Kuper; Elana Lakh; Moshe Landsman; Tony Lerman; Sheila Melzak; Mohamad Mukhaimar; Rateb Abu Rahmeh; Jacqueline Rose; Jihan Salem; Andrew Samuels; Eyad el Sarraj; Lynne Segal; Felicity de Zulueta.

Cost: Standard – £70 Birkbeck staff/all students/unwaged – £35

Registration, payment & information: www.bbk.ac.uk/bisr/news/Psychopolitical

Contact: j.eisner@bbk.ac.uk

Sponsored by: Barry Amiel & Norman Melburn Trust; FFIPP‐UK; IJV.


Eve of Conference meeting,14 October at 7.30pm:

Burning Memories: Sacrifice and the unconscious in history

Uri Hadar, Stephen Frosh, Eyad El Saraj,

Chair Lynne Segal

Friends House, Euston Road, 7.30pm

£10 employed; £5 unemployed. No reservations: payment at the door.

Organised by School of Psychosocial Studies, Birkbeck Institute of Social Research, Friends House