International Networking

Wed Nov 18 07:24:43 CST 2009

Dear all,

it is inspiring and a great gift for the students and our method that 
Herb Propper has been appointed a guest professor in dramatic arts - 
thanks so much because I assume that besides any talent there is a lot 
of hard work and personal engagement behind such nomination! I can only 
hope that some of us will help to accomplish the task Adam is asking for.

Natacha and me are going to have some psychodrama workshop in South 
India in early january accredited and organized by the university of 
Trivanduram (Thiruvananthapuram) and the youth coordinator of the 
region. Besides the students we will also work with adolescents. We are 
working together with a team of IAGP (Sabar Rustomjee, Haim Weinberg and 
Catherina Mela) introducing also group analysis and clinical group work 
at large to one of the most important professional events on Psychiatry 
and Psychotherapy in South India (as it is the philosophy of the 
cross-methodologic approach of IAGP). I am only mentioning our activity 
because I like to share with you how we will introduce psychodrama. We 
will talk after all about active group techniques and about processes of 
symbolization as the key elements psychodrama can offer to an 
integrative perspective of group work. We will use sociometry, role play 
and myths and dreams as "trans-cultural" containers and points of 
reference for our work. This offer is designed towards the needs of our 
hosts dealing with topics like suicide prevention (suicide as a long 
term consequence after the tsunami disaster), gender issues and health 
care (alimentation, AIDS, drugs) and identity crisis (traditional versus 
modern society). We have seen the program they usually use for their 
adolescent courses and it is already very skilled. So I recommand to ask 
after all for their established practise and programs finding the best 
way how to attach psychodramatic skills to their reality. I liked very 
much Connies remarks on Indonesia describing her way to answer to the 
need of giving hope again in such regions. I hope we will be able to do 
the same in India. I suggest to have an exchange afterwards in order to 
learn from each other and maybe even establish some guidelines or 
general recommendations for future work in those regions.

Concerning the international networking you Adam have mentioned I am 
stimulated to contribute to the description of its current state a 
little bit. First of all FEPTO is the overall network of psychodrama 
trainers, schools/institutes and associations in Europe. Meanwhile PifE 
is an association between several institutes in Europe it is also an 
affiliate member of FEPTO and its president is a member of the council 
board of FEPTO. So I feel that this integration on a european level is 
assumed in a very good way. This concerns Europe.

IAGP is international and it is not only representing psychodrama - as 
this was also the explicit wish of JL Moreno. He was even talking in one 
of his last letters about the "crowning achievement" of his life time 
work commenting the recently founded IAGP - because he wanted to be 
global and all-inclusive thinking on the future of humanity (for me this 
perspective is in no way megalomanic but a very needed reflection and 
consideration on one level of our responsabilty). So IAGP tries to 
include all the different regions and methods related to our field (we 
will have for example the first latin american regional conference 
together with FEBRAP from the 3d to the the 7th of september 2010 in Sao 
Paulo). I like to invite all of you to visit the new home page of IAGP 
(www.iagp.com) which is now bilingual and which will inform about future 
projects and activities on educational, social and humanitarian level in 
the next months. Our association is really open to all practisioners and 
experts of our field including for example drama therapists, colleagues 
from the Playback area as other active group techniques as well. Of 
course I would be delighted if some of you are interested to contact our 
office or me regarding membership with IAGP. Just a small remark on the 
word: integration. There are many examples that integration is not easy 
nor sometimes even possible or desirable. So I am very entusiastic when 
IAGP is at least able to facilitate processes of cooperation, of mutual 
fertilization and enrichment between different methods and cultures!

The IAGP psychodrama section is chaired now by Maurizio Gasseau, Ex Vice 
President of FEPTO (thanks again to Manuela Maciel who was leading the 
section during the last six years!). In the first meeting of the new 
section in august in Rome an international board was constituted 
including a lot of psychodramatists around the world. They will become 
active and will try to improve our networking - I am absolutely sure - 
inviting all members of this list to co-create and participate in new 
ideas and projects. So some of the points raised by you Adam will be 
taken care of this way. I am strongly convinced that this is a moment of 
good spirit and good prospects concerning our future development as a 
network. And I am pleased and thankful to have met in Rome Sue McMunn, 
Dena Baumgartner and Jacob Gershoni from the ASGPP as a personal 
encounter is not replacable by list exchange. And I am very thankful at 
the same time to the creator of this list, Tom Treadwell and the people 
who are maintaining it alive - after all Adam: a wonderful service for 
our community.

All the best, regards

Jorge Burmeister
President IAGP

Adam Blatner schrieb:
>  
> Dear Colleagues:
>    1. Herb Propper is out there pioneering psychodrama in Bangladesh. 
> He's half-written up some of his workshops, but needs someone who will 
> help shape these into a regular paper online. I'm caught up in many 
> other tasks, but we agreed to inquire whether anyone reading this 
> might be willing to read over his notes and re-frame them as a 
> narrative. We could then post it on your website or mine or somewhere 
> where everyone can read it.
>         What is interesting is : a. How do we introduce psychodramatic 
> methods (in the largest sense) to a new population; adapt it to their 
> level and needs?
>   b. What is the sequencing of techniques? c. What techniques are 
> modified, developed in new ways.
>               If anyone would be willing to spend a few hours doing 
> this, I'll forward the reports of his activities.
>                          Warmly, Adam Blatner
>  
> p.s., Also,
> Here are some ideas about how we can network international psychodrama 
> a little more. FEPTO is doing a good job with Europe, but I'd like to 
> see at least an occasional clear integration effort with IAGP, PIfE, 
> and other organizations in other parts of the world. I am also 
> wondering if there might be others who help network in a variety of ways:
>     -- network and correspond with each other---i.e., the major 
> networkers organize to promote the general idea of networking, which 
> would include such sub-roles as
>                -- identifying and engaging new people from other 
> countries, getting email addresses and putting folks in touch with 
> each other
>                -- encouraging and thinking of ways to support folks in 
> various regions to develop their own internal networking systems
>  
>      -- once a year international report of status of psychodrama in 
> various countries, new books, articles, estimated membership, when 
> next national conference is, visiting trainers, new and emerging local 
> trainers and institutes, some photos (close up head shots of trainers 
> especially), reports, new branching-off efforts of sociodrama, 
> applications beyond therapy, bridging to other arts or therapeutic 
> approaches
>      -- support for Michael in Austria as he takes on the 
> responsibility for the internationa psychodrama bibliography
>      -- consideration of an international journal online; and also a 
> website for less-formal articles, etc. I may pass along scanned on 
> articles from various sources; or an international newsletter with 
> links to local newsletters online, so a person could easily find out 
> more about what's happening in
>          -- USA  PNN is now online
>          -- Australia & New Zealand? --- what's online
>          -- UK -- I think Tele---their newsletter has gone online
>          -- FEPTO has been great this way. Great appreciation to 
> Horatiu Nil Albini
>          -- what about PIfE doing likewise?
>          -- Could we get a summary-translation of events in various 
> countries in South America?
>          
>      -- anyone else who might help duplicate papers and make them 
> available to the community as I'm beginning to get some role fatigue
>      -- help in circulating materials, books, from retired people in 
> the field. Contacting those who retire and seek to get their books and 
> papers back into circulation
>      -- links from various websites to my psychodrama photo directory 
> of international people.. and historical figues.. or someone else to 
> supplement or take over that role...
>       -- other ideas... ? 
>  
> Warmly, Adam Blatner
>  
> p.s., do people in your psychodrama networks know about my website? 
> There are many papers and other resources there for your enjoyment and 
> people should feel free to download and translate anything that is up 
> there.  www.blatner.com/adam/ <http://www.blatner.com/adam/>
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