other family grouping, then the ‘graces’ idea is a very important one to bear in mind. They help to remind me to question the notion of family norms or normativity, since I, in my position of privilege for example, am not the arbiter of what is normal. And besides which, aspects of their experience as a family might be beyond my ken or sphere of experience, since I have never known what it like to be a Nigerian immigrant single mother, for example. So paying heed to the ‘graces’ helps us to be sensitive to those aspects of ‘intersectionality’ and identity which we might otherwise fail to recognise the existence of and properly understand the infl uence of. Richard: So ‘heteronormativity’ for example is something that family therapy will have paid attention to ahead of the other therapeutic disciplines? Ged: I hesitate a little to make that claim, but my guess is that we probably have, because we’ve been mindful of diff erent models of family for many years. But ‘heteronormativity’ is just one of a number of assumptions about life and relationships which come from the dominant discourses in our society. We have to pay attention to it if we are to be useful therapists who are available to eff ect the changes that people are asking for but maybe not quite articulating. If we disregard someone who lacks power, because of a structural inequality in society, then we disregard those factors that impinge upon and limit people’s opportunities and positions in the family and the wider society. Richard: In early this century ‘Austerity Britain’, many of the social, cultural and even governmental institutions that have contained and protected people and made sense of public or communal living have been dismantled, or degraded, perhaps leading people to experience ever greater alienation, disconnection and vulnerability. Does family therapy see evidence of this in the consulting room? Ged: Certainly, poverty is real, and austerity is real, and both aff ect the lives of people in very real ways, and sometimes we need to be humble about our therapeutic eff ectiveness. If someone is struggling with poverty or homelessness, or other social injustices or diffi culties, then there is a limit to what family therapy might be able to off er. Some families would benefi t more from a three-bedroom house than they ever would from family therapy, that’s the reality! Living in a one-bedroom house with


32


Richard Curtis (left) and Ged Smith


four people, and the stress attached to that, is a reality that all the family therapy in the world won’t change much. Richard: So there is a limit to the extent that the new perspective (as gained in family therapy) can have on a person or family? That reality based circumstances place a limit on how much a problem might be ameliorated? Ged: Only in the same way any type of therapy might be limited by real world issues like poverty. But generally I wouldn’t say that. Let’s take the example of someone who has had a very abusive childhood, and grows up to be given a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder. When they come to family therapy with their children they may talk about some of their childhood experiences; how they struggled to parent eff ectively, because they felt bad about themselves, because they had always been criticised and rubbished by their parents as useless and worthless. So many times, older or adult children say ‘Mum, Dad, I never realised that, or knew


that, or realised how that impacted on you, that makes me see things diff erently’. So of course there is a limit, but I’d say that even though these issues relate to ‘rotten life syndromes’, I still think that talking about them, and their impact on the family relationship in family therapy can make a big impact, because it helps people to realise things for the fi rst time. So no, it can still be hugely important even in ongoing adverse circumstances. Richard: And is it possible to say in which directions current developments in family therapy are heading? Ged: No. If I knew, then I’d be already doing it! Really, I’d say that I would guess that the future will be in doing more of what we are doing now, which is further opening to the infl uence of other discourses and disciplines. If the fi rst order of family therapy was performing therapy from a position of expert ‘doing’ therapy to the family, the second order is collaboratively co-constructing ways forward with families being equal in the


Context 170, August 2020


Groups in family therapy


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