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In this paper Michael White documents the use of katharsis and rite of passage metaphors within therapy, teaching and community work contexts. This paper was written to be given as an evening address to participants prior to the Dulwich Centre Publications' International Narrative Therapy and Community Work Conference held at Spelman College in Atlanta in June, 2002. As practitioners from many different countries gathered together in the beautiful grounds of the historically black women's college, there was an increasing sense of anticipation about what experiences lay ahead of us. Never before had such an event been held at an historically black college, and participants and organisers alike felt powerfully welcomed by Vanessa McAdams-Mahmoud of Spelman College and the local African American community. We didn't know exactly where this was all leading, we only knew that we were delighted to be travelling together. What was clear was that thorough preparation would be required to make this event all that it could be. The writing and delivery of this paper was one aspect of these conference preparations. Now, six months later, we would once again like to thank Vanessa McAdams-Mahmoud, Vanessa Jackson and Makungu Akinyela for inviting us to host the conference at Spelman College, and for making possible what was a rigorous, generous-hearted and healing event.
Keywords: katharsis, rite of passage, narrative therapy
Therapeutic journeys
Today, as much as ever, ahead of my first meetings with the people who consult me, I experience feelings of anticipation, degrees of apprehension, and a sense of heightened expectations. This is anticipation of other journeys to be had - not just any old journeys, but ones that will, like those before it, take me to destinations that I could not have predicted, by routes not previously mapped. This is an apprehension that relates to the responsibility that I have, as a therapist, for the travelling circumstances, and for the journey's outcome. And these are heightened expectations in regard to yet more opportunities to be transported to other places in life in which I might become other than who I was at the outset of the journey - amongst other things, expectations of opportunities to:
a) think beyond what I routinely think,
b) extend upon and to reconsider established understandings...