Deconstruction and Narrative Therapy

Narrative therapy draws upon the work of Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault to question singular truth claims about human experience. While Derrida takes us beyond what is blatant to latent readings of an expressed word or phrase, Foucault destabilizes knowledge by situating taken-for-granted practices of the self in the historical contexts from which they sprang.

Any truth claim about personhood has more to do with power than its inviolability. Once exposed as less than bedrock, it becomes possible to play with meaning rather than search for it, as if it were there all along, waiting in pristine form, unsullied by culture and untarnished by time. This does not make dominant truths wrong any more than they are right. Rather, they are to be taken as subjectively useful or useless depending on the user’s inclination.

There is no shortage of truth claims for individuals, couples and families to live by. In narrative therapy a space is reserved for those seeking help to claim their own preferences, even in a field where voices tinged with a professional tenor aim to impress. It is through the critique of expert knowledge that agency and imagination can achieve momentum.