ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author considers the relationship of positioning to power. The ideas of Michel Foucault inform how power is conceptualized in social construction and post-structural theory. Power is about exerting influence. The author provides an awareness of positioning and power relations as an act of accountability, and the ways in which power operates through language. Understanding these considerations helps us as youth workers to support young people in assuming authority over their own stories. Authority is a mnemonic to highlight the productive power located in the ability to write, speak, and live one’s own experience from one’s own perspective. Youth work done from a constructionist stance accounts for the effects of power. Being influential acknowledges that the youth worker has an impact through what they bring to the relationship and through their facilitative role as a conversationalist.
