"Hall of Mirrors" Revisited:
Psychotherapeutic Playback Theatre as Group analytic Drama Therapy \ Ronen Kowalsky
Psychotherapeutic Playback Theatre as Group analytic Drama Therapy \ Ronen Kowalsky
Playback Theatre is a form of improvisational theatre in which audience or group members tell stories from their lives and watch them enacted on stage (Fox, 1986). Playback Theater is also adapted for use in therapeutic settings by various psychotherapists as a form of group drama therapy (e.g. Salas, 2008). However, a unifying theory of psychotherapeutic playback theater was never presented. The present workshop will present and demonstrate such a theory initiated from a group analytic point of view. Thus, the present workshop will present psychotherapeutic playback theater as "group analytic drama therapy", giving creative wings to and rooted in group analysis.
During sessions of psychotherapeutic playback theater group members switch continuously between "playing the other", experience and practice the ability to observe the situation from his/her perspective, and "allowing the other to play me", and thus expanding the perspective of looking at multiple self states using the perspective of the other. A language of theatrical images is being created gradually through this process, providing ongoing training in empathy. The theatrical enactment will be examined as a creative working through the dynamic matrix using mirroring, resonance, exchange and condenser phenomena (Foulkes & Anthony, 1965).
The participants will experience Psychotherapeutic Playback Theatre session, which will be analyzed in group analytic concepts.
Previous experience in theater is not required.
Keywords: Group Analysis, Drama Therapy, Playback Theater, Exchange, Matrix, Multiple Self States.
Bibliography
Foulkes , R. H., & Anthony, E. J., (1965). Group Psychotherapy: The Psychoanalytic Approach. London: Penguin Books.
Fox,J., (1986). Acts Of Service: Spontaneity, Commitment, Tradition in the Nonscripted Theatre. New-York: Tusitala Publishing.
Salas, J., (2008). Do My Story, Sing My Song: Music therapy and Playback Theatre with troubled children. New-York: Tusitala Publishing.
During sessions of psychotherapeutic playback theater group members switch continuously between "playing the other", experience and practice the ability to observe the situation from his/her perspective, and "allowing the other to play me", and thus expanding the perspective of looking at multiple self states using the perspective of the other. A language of theatrical images is being created gradually through this process, providing ongoing training in empathy. The theatrical enactment will be examined as a creative working through the dynamic matrix using mirroring, resonance, exchange and condenser phenomena (Foulkes & Anthony, 1965).
The participants will experience Psychotherapeutic Playback Theatre session, which will be analyzed in group analytic concepts.
Previous experience in theater is not required.
Keywords: Group Analysis, Drama Therapy, Playback Theater, Exchange, Matrix, Multiple Self States.
Bibliography
Foulkes , R. H., & Anthony, E. J., (1965). Group Psychotherapy: The Psychoanalytic Approach. London: Penguin Books.
Fox,J., (1986). Acts Of Service: Spontaneity, Commitment, Tradition in the Nonscripted Theatre. New-York: Tusitala Publishing.
Salas, J., (2008). Do My Story, Sing My Song: Music therapy and Playback Theatre with troubled children. New-York: Tusitala Publishing.