Granada IAGP Academy Just Completed

[Peter Howie]

Dear Ed,

This would definitely attract me to undertake the long journey for a short time.

Cheers 


Peter all the way down here in Brisbane, Australia



At 04:16 AM 30/05/2008, Edward Schreiber wrote:
>May 29, 2008
>IAGP Academy - Granada Spain -  
>
>Dear Colleagues,
>
>I want to share with you about the International Association of Group  
>Psychotherapy and Group Processes (IAGP) annual Academy just  
>completed in Granada, Spain.  The Academy takes place each year in  
>Granada, in the south of Spain.  The Academy brings together three  
>group models: the psychodramatic group, the group analytic group, and  
>the group dynamic model.  About 100 people from around the globe  
>attended and it is growing. The rate of growth of the Academy is the  
>result of the shared learning from many cultures of these three  
>models and the potential for helping the world situation.
>
>I was a member of the Academy and I presented both a lecture and a 3  
>day workshop about Sociatry much of the work from our research of the  
>unpublished material of Dr. Moreno.  I am convinced he was not simply  
>a psychodramatist or psychiatrist, he was fundamentally a  
>sociatrist.  He wrote about the world as one group, and about the  
>large sociometric structures impacting humanity, which he called the  
>sociodynamic effect impacting all groups, to which sociatry must  
>attend.  The IAGP Academy is a true living example of sociatry in  
>action.
>
>In a letter I read from Zerka Moreno to the Academy, she noted that  
>J.L. Moreno started the IAGP in 1951 as a way to change the world  
>order, not only to help people to adjust.  To this day the IAGP and  
>the Granada Academy brings together different models of group work  
>and people from many lands to address the needs and realities of  
>human life.
>
>There were outstanding practitioners and students at the Academy from  
>Spain, England, Israel, Morocco, Ireland, Germany, Italy, Austria,  
>Greece, South Africa, Cuba, Nicaragua, Chile, Mexico, Guatemala,  
>Argentina and Brazil.  I was the lone American.  The Academy is a  
>brilliantly designed conference structure unlike any I have ever  
>before experienced.  In the morning there is a lecture and  
>discussion, setting a tone for the day.  After the lecture there are  
>small and medium size groups from each of the models:  a small and  
>medium size psychodrama group, analytic group, and group dynamic  
>group.  These groups form on the first morning of the Academy using  
>sociometry and stay together through the entire 5 days.   There is a  
>nice long lunch and siesta break followed with another set of groups  
>which are topic focussed and meet through the Academy.
>
>At the end of each day the entire Academy meets in one large group.   
>Each year the type of large group changes, this year it was based in  
>the group dynamic model.  The structure reflects years of thoughtful  
>and creative programming, masterfully done to maximize connection and  
>learning.  The richness of bringing together three models of group  
>work with so many cultures made for an exceptionally rich  
>experience.  Power, domination, culture and history, language,  
>translation, gender, boundary issues and differences of time, space  
>and proximity, politics, analysis, sociometry, sociometric  
>connections, triangles, dyads and synchroncity all emerged.
>
>One morning lecture was given by a psychiatrist-psychodramatist from  
>Chile who led groups in silence in a prison camp during the military  
>dictatorship where he was imprisoned and where he developed a model  
>of psychorama:  internal and in silence, to help others in the camp.
>Granada, Spain is the site of the Academy and it felt like the right  
>place at the right time.  Granada is close to Morocco and has a large  
>and vibrant Arab population and history, mixed in with a history of  
>Jews who came to Granada 600 years before the birth of Christ and  
>there is a deeply rooted Christian tradition and history.  These  
>major religions and cultures have emerged and have created a unique  
>melding melting - called Mudejar - a
>blended creation and fusion of the three.  The entire city sits below  
>the Alahmbra, an ancient Mosque and Palace with Christian influence.   
>The amazing nature of the Academy were the sociometric relationships  
>which emerged, the tele.
>
>As an example, and Italian psychologist offered a Jungian group that  
>took place in the Arab Baths, making use of water during the group  
>sessions.  During one of their sessions the image of the butterfly  
>appeared and emerged.  Around the same time in another group at a  
>different site with a different group model, the image of a butterfly  
>emerged as a theme.  The next day in the lecture I gave to the  
>Academy on sociatry, I concluded with a presentation about the  
>metamorphesis of the caterpillar to the butterfly, the "imaginal  
>cells" in the caterpillar that carry the DNA and blue print for the  
>transformation - and how humanity is in the same process during this  
>period of global climate warming and how in fact we are the "imaginal  
>cells".  These synchroncities of connection extended deep into the  
>group gathered who have all now left and returned to their own  
>sociometric networks, all in some way deeply changed.
>
>Like all endeavors it had some limitations.  There lacked  
>participation from other parts of Africa and unlike past years, there  
>were no Palistineans participating.  For some members of the Academy  
>there were conflicts about boundaries of time.  The starting and  
>ending of groups had a fluidity to it, a kind of dance unfamiliar to  
>some of us.  For others, in the analytic model, time boundaries were  
>important and needed more attending to hold, frame and contain.  Time  
>and space for some became an issue, reflecting differences of  
>culture.  The process of defining oneself seemed to be a theme for  
>the whole experience.  This defining of self was steeped in depth and  
>richness of differences of culture and approaches, with much to  
>reflect upon.
>
>This was a very active sociometry!  One reason was the Spanish  
>culture and Granada, where physical proximity, emotion, passion and  
>eroticism are much more in the air than in much of North America.   
>There was an almost endless physical contact in the passing of  
>strangers on the street.  The richness and heart of the Arab  
>communities, their generosity, openness impacted the setting.  Chance  
>meetings with a shop keeper in the Arab markets let to suggestions  
>for where to visit small villages, which led to another discussion  
>with another shopkeeper about Clinton and Obama.  A chance lunch at  
>an Arab cafe with a group from the Academy led to an invitation to an  
>encounter a few days later about the nature of religion and God.  I  
>arrived for this meeting to find that a feast had been prepared of  
>traditional food as a gift and to honor an encounter between an  
>Spanish Muslim and this American psychodramtist, an encounter in an  
>ancient Arab market.
>
>The Academy was a wonderful chance to meet some of the members of the  
>IAGP - Moreno's other organization - and taught me a great deal about  
>conferences, conference structures and sociometric links.  The next  
>Academy will take place in Granada in 2009.
>
>Best,
>
>Edward Schreiber
>
>
>
>
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