Course Description:

This course will focus on theoretical understandings of the psychological development of women and their clinical applications. Traditional theories and contemporary feminist psychodynamic and social-constructionist theories of women's development will be discussed. Particular emphasis will be placed on the influence of cultural perspectives in the construction of possible life narratives for women.

We will rely heavily on a theoretical frame provided by narrative psychology. This perspective focuses on the role narratives and life stories play in the formation of identity; on the cultural conditions that may constrain or facilitate the development of such narratives; and on the effect that critical insight and engagement may have on the transformation of stories and narratives. Stories lived and stories told by people, as well as stories heard by psychotherapists, are influenced by what is culturally and theoretically acceptable. Not only acceptable behaviors but also acceptable accounts are regulated by society. When societal transformations occur, the acceptable accounts are also transformed. The individual desire and the societal possibilities both push the limits and constrain the boundaries of the lived story.

As therapists, we are interested in the development of lives, but our access to lives is through stories about them. In this course we will try to understand how the stories psychology tells about women and the stories women tell about themselves are both made possible and constrained by social constructions of reality. We will look at the effect societal transformations have on the stories told, both theoretically and personally, and on the liberatory and transformative consequences of new stories for the development of theory and the psychological development of women. Obviously, this perspective has strong implications for psychotherapy with women of all cultural backgrounds.

Required Texts:

- Brown, L.S. (1994). Subversive Dialogues: Theory in feminist therapy. N.Y.: Basic Books.

- Brown, L.S. & Ballou, M. (Eds.). (1992). Personality and psychopathology: Feminist reappraisals. N.Y.:Guilford Press.

- Comas-Diaz, L. & Greene, B. (Eds). (1994). Women of color: Integrating ethnic and gender in psychotherapy. N.Y.:Guilford Press.

- Espin, O.M. (1997). Latina Realities: Essays on healing, migration and sexuality. Boulder, CO: Westview.

- Kaschak, E.(1992). Engendered lives: A new psychology of women's experience.  N.Y.: Basic Books.

- Layton, L. (1998). Who's that girl? Who's that boy? Clinical practice meets post-modern gender theory. NJ: Jason Aronson.

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