 Presentation Abstracts
Sunday, June 7 |
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| Theatre of the Body: Russian Theatre Tradition in Gestalt
INTERNATIONAL This workshop presents an application of Russian theater tradition (K. Stanislavsky, M. Chechov schools) to Gestalt work. From Gestalt perspective body is a personification of inner life; it is materialized contact-boundary between inner world and environment. Body and its gestures are what another person can experience. We can look at body experience as a key to awareness of feelings, needs, and wishes. Idea of wholeness of spiritual and physical dimensions were presented in actors masterpiece school of Stanislavsky and Chechov. We will introduce participants to method of awareness and expressing one's process through acting gestures (based on Chechovís school).
The Development of the Baby and Gestalt Therapy INTERNATIONAL In this presentation we will discuss the development of the baby in Gestalt therapy theoretical principles. Studies on infant development bring important contributions to the diagnosis and understanding of the child in therapy. We think about development as successive circular creative adjustment processes. Based on authors such as Welheim, Stern, Klauss, we try to understand how the very first contact episodes occur at the mother/baby boundary and it's implications for child development. We want participants to learn how important the mother/baby relationship is during pregnancy and the potential of the newborn child from a Gestalt therapy perspective.
The Anthropological Use of Self INTERNATIONAL The management of differences is a core leadership competency. Phenomenological tasks for facilitators of cultural diversity are to be both receptive and responsive to the anthropological complexity that individuals and groups confront in the management of diversity issues. An increasingly recognized requirement for agents of change, cultural competency requires an intentional extension of naturally ethnocentric self boundaries and judicious use of one's own resources. Workshop participants will be presented with a series of leadership exercises that address multicultural awareness and aware use of self. Outcome learnings will respond to the choicepoints leaders can consider in the anthropological use of self.
Addiction and Recovery: Dilemmas of Relatedness Michael C. Clemmens, Ph.D.; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Historically, addiction has been defined as an interruption of contact. Perls described alcoholism as an introjective style of behavior. Expanding this definition to the field, addiction is also a solution to the dilemmas of interpersonal contact; of managing self in relation to others. As the addict in recovery moves into the world, he/she experiences expanding boundaries of relationship with him/her self. The focus of this workshop is a Gestalt model of addiction and recovery that is both physiological and relational. We will explore the addict's dilemmas through a short didactic presentation, experiential exercises, and small group case discussions.
Adding Women's Voices: Feminism and Gestalt Therapy Women's Issues in Gestalt Therapy Interest Group As members of the AAGT Women's Interest Group, we discovered a shared tension between our self-awareness as feminists and our professional lives as Gestalt therapists. Studies of how women learn and grow reinforce our sense that current Gestalt language does not adequately reflect female experience. We will facilitate an experiment in reading selections from Gestalt sources with altered pronouns and in female voices, to see what new experience might emerge for both women and men. This becomes the basis for exploring and creating theory from our lives as women, continuing a dialogue between feminism and Gestalt that enhances both.
Educational Therapy for Academic Anxieties Cara Garcia, Ph.D. and Susan Baker, M.A; Los Angeles, California "Academic anxiety" embraces test anxiety, writer's block, stage fright, math anxiety, etc., across the curriculum. The Academic Anxiety Program at Pepperdine University (Los Angeles) is grounded in Gestalt theory and practice. The presenters will show artifacts and video clips of academic anxiety work with children, adolescents, and adults in school and clinic settings. Examples of dialogue and experiments will be discussed in terms of the dialectic which occurs between concentration and interruption throughout the phases of the Gestalt Cycle of Experience. Presenters and participants will discuss the application of presentation to the training/teaching needs of session participants.
Building Common Ground in Communities & Organizations: A Gestalt Perspective Eileen Hogan, B.A., Kent, Ohio and Octavia Seawell, M.A., Washington, D.C. Using the Cleveland School's diagnostic model, The Experience Cycle, the presenters will share their experience in using the Future Search process to facilitate change in communities and organizations. This process facilitates the discovery of common ground and the development of "compelling" group pictures (figures) of the future. Future Search is a large group planning process that enables diverse people with a stake in a community or organization to plan for and create their own desired future. In this process people have an opportunity to take ownership of their past, present, and future; confirm their mutual values (ground); and create plans for change.
Shame and Support: Treating the Intimate Couple Robert G. Lee, Ph.D.; Newtonville, Massachusetts In this workshop we will explore how a knowledge of Gestalt field theory and shame can lead us to a model that produces new understandings of the nature of intimacy and provides us with tools that can transform couples' most heart wrenching, difficult times into opportunities for greater connection and intimacy. Didactic presentation will trace the development of shame theory in general and how it relates to the intimate couple in particular. An experiential exercise will be used to ground participants in the connections between shame and intimacy. Didactic presentation of treatment implications and tools, exemplified with case material, will follow.
Preadolescence: the Emergent Self Mark McConville, Ph.D., Cleveland, Ohio; Gordon Wheeler, Ph.D., Cambridge, Massachusetts Preadolescence is a transitional stage in development, neglected in the literature but the most common age for clinical intervention in childhood. Part 1: We will use an exercise to present a Gestalt model of self and development, focusing on the dynamic conditions of the whole field. Part 2: We will use this model to explore the development self-tasks of the preadolescent child, with emphasis on how the Gestalt perspective clarified developmental issues, and grounds and supports interventions in the whole developmental field. Our discussion will draw on case material and the clinical and personal experience of the whole group.
Tami Saltz, M.A., LPC and Carol Swanson, LCSW; Portland, Oregon Was this was your first visit to the world of Gestalt? Or have you been renewing your friendship? Join us for this review and completion session now that the conference is almost over. We will provide you with a glossary of all the terms, a description of concepts that are central to Gestalt theory and include some basic Gestalt awareness exercises. We will also do some demonstration work and hope to help you in the process of integrating your experiences here at the conference. |
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