Michael White (29 December 1948 – 4 April 2008) was an Australian

social work Social work is an academic discipline and practice-based profession concerned with meeting the basic needs of individuals, families, groups, communities, and society as a whole to enhance their individual and collective well-being. Social wo ...

er and

family therapist Family therapy (also referred to as family counseling, family systems therapy, marriage and family therapy, couple and family therapy) is a branch of psychotherapy focused on family, families and couples in intimate relationships to nurture chang ...

. He is known as the founder of

narrative therapy Narrative therapy (or narrative practice) is a form of psychotherapy that seeks to help patients identify their values and the skills associated with them. It provides the patient with knowledge of their ability to embody these values so they ca ...

, and for his significant contribution to

psychotherapy Psychotherapy (also psychological therapy, talk therapy, or talking therapy) is the use of Psychology, psychological methods, particularly when based on regular Conversation, personal interaction, to help a person change behavior, increase hap ...

and

family therapy Family therapy (also referred to as family counseling, family systems therapy, marriage and family therapy, couple and family therapy) is a branch of psychotherapy focused on families and couples in intimate relationships to nurture change and ...

, which have been a source of techniques adopted by other approaches.

Biography

Michael Kingsley White was born and raised in Adelaide, South Australia. His first professional job was as a probation and welfare worker. He earned an undergraduate social work degree from the

University of South Australia The University of South Australia is a public research university based in Adelaide, South Australia. Established in 1991, it is the successor of the former South Australian Institute of Technology. Its main campuses along North Terrace are ...

in 1979 and worked as a psychiatric social worker at the Adelaide Children's Hospital. He founded the Dulwich Centre in 1983 and began a private practice as a family therapist. He continued to be associated with Dulwich Centre until his death. White was a practicing

er and co-director of the Dulwich Centre in

Adelaide Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. The name "Adelaide" may refer to ei ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

, and was author of several books of importance in the field of family therapy and narrative therapy. In January 2008, White set up the Adelaide Narrative Therapy Centre to provide counselling services and training workshops relevant to work with individuals, couples, families, groups and communities and to provide a context for exploring recent developments relevant to narrative practice." Michael White was also particularly known for his work with children and Indigenous Aboriginal communities, as well as with schizophrenia, anorexia/bulimia, men's violence, and trauma. He received the following awards, honours, invitations: * International Fellow, American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy * Masters Interview, American Association of Marriage and Family Therapy Conference, San Francisco, 1989. * Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters, John F. Kennedy University, Orinda, California. * Distinguished Contribution to Family Therapy Theory & Practice Award, American Family Therapy Academy, 1999.

Work

Influences

While early influences included those of systems theory and cybernetics (

Gregory Bateson Gregory Bateson (9 May 1904 – 4 July 1980) was an English anthropology, anthropologist, social sciences, social scientist, linguistics, linguist, visual anthropology, visual anthropologist, semiotics, semiotician, and cybernetics, cybernetici ...

), White's main work drew on a wide range of sources, including literary theory (

Jerome Bruner Jerome Seymour Bruner (October 1, 1915 – June 5, 2016) was an American psychologist who made significant contributions to human cognitive psychology and cognitive learning theory (education), learning theory in educational psychology. Bruner was ...

), cultural anthropology (

Clifford Geertz Clifford James Geertz (; August 23, 1926 – October 30, 2006) was an American anthropologist who is remembered mostly for his strong support for and influence on the practice of symbolic anthropology and who was considered "for three decades&n ...

, Barbara Myerhoff,

Victor Turner Victor Witter Turner (28 May 1920 – 18 December 1983) was a British cultural anthropologist best known for his work on symbols, rituals, and rite of passage, rites of passage. His work, along with that of Clifford Geertz and others, is often ...

), non-structuralist psychology (

William James William James (January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910) was an American philosopher and psychologist. The first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States, he is considered to be one of the leading thinkers of the late 19th c ...

Lev Vygotsky Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky (, ; ; – June 11, 1934) was a Russian and Soviet psychologist, best known for his work on psychological development in children and creating the framework known as cultural-historical activity theory. After his ear ...

) and French critical /

post-structuralist Post-structuralism is a philosophical movement that questions the objectivity or stability of the various interpretive structures that are posited by structuralism and considers them to be constituted by broader systems of Power (social and poli ...

philosophy (

Jacques Derrida Jacques Derrida (; ; born Jackie Élie Derrida;Peeters (2013), pp. 12–13. See also 15 July 1930 – 9 October 2004) was a French Algerian philosopher. He developed the philosophy of deconstruction, which he utilized in a number of his texts, ...

Gilles Deleuze Gilles Louis René Deleuze (18 January 1925 – 4 November 1995) was a French philosopher who, from the early 1950s until his death in 1995, wrote on philosophy, literature, film, and fine art. His most popular works were the two volumes o ...

and

Michel Foucault Paul-Michel Foucault ( , ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French History of ideas, historian of ideas and Philosophy, philosopher who was also an author, Literary criticism, literary critic, Activism, political activist, and teacher. Fo ...

Theoretical and practice innovations

Key

therapeutic A therapy or medical treatment is the attempted remediation of a health problem, usually following a medical diagnosis. Both words, ''treatment'' and ''therapy'', are often abbreviated tx, Tx, or Tx. As a rule, each therapy has indications an ...

ideas developed by White include 'externalizing the problem', commonly summarised as 'the person is not the problem, the problem is the problem'; 're-authoring' the dominant stories of people's lives; and the idea of 'double-listening' to accounts of trauma: not only the accounts of trauma itself, but how people have responded to trauma. Key practices of narrative therapy and 'maps' of narrative practice include: * The statement of position map / externalising conversations map * Re-authoring conversations * Re-membering conversations * Definitional ceremonies * Scaffolding conversations * The absent but implicit * Responding to personal failure conversations''Narrative Means to Therapeutic Ends''; ''Maps of Narrative Practice''; White, M. (2000). ''Reflections on Narrative Practice'' Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications

Publications

* 1989. ''Literate Means to Therapeutic Ends''. With David Epston. Adelaide: Dulwich Centre Publications. * 1990. ''Narrative Means to Therapeutic Ends''. With David Epston. (WW Norton & Company, New York). * 1995. ''Re-Authoring Lives: Interviews and Essays''. Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications. * 1995. ''Narratives of Therapists' Lives''. Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications. * 2000. ''Reflections on Narrative Practice''. Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications. * 2004. ''Narrative Practice and Exotic Lives: Resurrecting diversity in everyday life''. Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications. * 1992. ''Experience, Contradiction, Narrative and Imagination: Selected papers of David Epston & Michael White, 1989-1991''. With David Epston. Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications. * 2006. ''Narrative Therapy with Children and their Families''. With Alice Morgan. Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications. * 2007. ''Maps of Narrative Practice''. (WW Norton & Company, New York) * 2011. ''Narrative Practice: Continuing the conversations''. (WW Norton & Company, New York) Michael White's books have also been published in Danish, Spanish, Japanese, Swedish, Italian, German, Chinese, Finnish, French and Portuguese.

Magazine articles and radio features

* Cowley, G. & K. Springen. (1995)
Rewriting life stories. ''Newsweek'', 17 April.
* Wylie, M.S. (1994)
Panning for gold. ''Family Therapy Networker, 18''(6), 40-48.

ABC Radio National, broadcast 23 December 1999 (repeated 8 October 2002).
Writing on the Mind – the power of story telling, ''All in the Mind''
ABC

Radio National ABC Radio National, more commonly known as Radio National or simply RN, is an Australian nationwide public service radio network run by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). From 1947 until 1985, the network was known as ABC Radio 2. ...

, broadcast 1 October 2005.

References

External links

Dulwich Centre: Gateway to Narrative Therapy and Community WorkNarrative Practice AdelaideMichael White Archive

Narrative Therapy Bibliography
* Australia news , The Guardian, June 17, 2008br>Social Construction Therapies Network
{{DEFAULTSORT:White, Michael 2008 deaths 1948 births Australian psychologists Constructivism (psychological school) Australian psychotherapists Family therapists Health professionals from Adelaide 20th-century German psychologists