ABSTRACT
This book will open by rooting the exploration in the real world by highlighting the emergence of Donald Trump, the Alt & Far Right movements across the West, Brexit, the refugee crisis in Europe, the #metoo movement, Black Lives Matter, and LGBTQI rights. The chapter then progresses to consider how the more established traditional means of working with difference are within psychotherapy: from the inception of culture, gender, sexuality, specific counselling programs, to considerations of how to work with difference therapeutically. The problem though is twofold; first the intersectional nature of difference and diversity is not considered within psychotherapy training, and second, very little of this discourse happens around the unconscious relational nature of difference, and the internalised impact of being othered by a subject, or by a counsellor/psychotherapist. This chapter therefore makes the case for working more with the unconscious, before offering a definition of systemic oppression.
Using a Jungian lens, the idea of internalised experiences, symbolism, the idea of the other being the shadow, and how in Jung’s words ‘projections change the world into one’s own unknown face’ roots this book very much within the counselling and psychotherapy world. The introduction will then introduce some of the creative techniques used to access the said unconscious process.
