A warm welcome to our December 1st edition of the IC and TCJ news.
This month we bring you a fascinating range of papers from practitioners and researchers from across our international community.
In this edition we are pleased to be able to publish two research papers – the first is Part 3 of the Butterfly longitudinal research project by Glenn Miles, Vanntheary Lim and Channtha Nann. The Butterfly project is a 10 year research project from Cambodia following the lives of 128 survivors of human trafficking. Our second research paper is an MA dissertation by Catrien Du Toit from North West University, Namibia entitled: ‘A rapid review of attachment themes in existing training programmes for social workers’ this research looks at the need for informing social workers about attachment theory in order to support their work with foster carers.
Annie Lord from the Planned Environment Therapy Archive shares the first of two papers about consultancy. The first is ‘A short biography of Harold Bridger’ based on her work cataloguing the Harold Bridger collection. The paper explores aspects of his consultancy work informed by psychoanalytic principles, while he was with the Tavistock Institute of Human Relations. Work on this collection is supported by a grant from the Wellcome foundation.
Andrew Collie is an organisational consultant to children’s homes and services. In his paper ‘Early Trauma and Staff Dynamics in Therapeutic Communities’, he writes about the importance of keeping a perspective on how the unconscious projection of traumatic experiences can impact and influence the dynamics of staff teams working with children and young people, who have experienced profound early years trauma. The paper is written from a systems- psychodynamics perspective.
Dr Keith White writes his two regular features, the first ‘What is Your Favourite Colour?’ explores his interactions with the natural world with reference to the work of D W Winnicott and Greta Thunberg, while away on their annual holiday in North Wales with children and families from Mill Grove. His second paper follows on from an article in the previous October 1st edition, with a further exploration of how guilt, blame, and shame may be played out between ‘Relationships with Siblings Who Have Suffered Separation and Loss.’
You may be interested in this newly published book by Annie Skinner who is involved with the Child Care History Network. Further details of ‘Behind Closed Doors: Hidden Histories of Children Committed to Care in the Late Nineteenth Century (1882-1889)’ can be found here https://amzn.to/3paII4P
Wishing all our readers a peaceful and restful Christmas and a happy new year.
John Diamond
International Centre News And Upcoming Events
We ran a very successful annual conference ‘Environments for Recovery’ on November 12th at Oxford Quaker Centre in partnership with The Institute for Recovery from Childhood Trauma (IRCT). This was our first face to face conference since 2019, and although numbers were down a bit due to a resurgence in Covid rates, the feedback was very positive including comments about the importance of coming together again to listen to the presentations and share experiences.
Dates for Your Diary:
A series of online events from The Mulberry Bush and Orb8
You may be interested in our ongoing range of monthly online events for foster carers and residential workers in partnership with mental health social enterprise Orb8.
Establishing a Community of Practice in Fostering & Residential Care
Friday 21 January 2022 from 11am – 1pm, online via Zoom
Book your place here.
Experts by Experience – The Power of Relationships
Friday 25 February 2022 from 10am – 1pm, online via Zoom
Book your place here.
“Delinquency is a Sign of Hope” – Turning on the Light in the Darkest of Times
Friday 18 March 2022 from 10am – 1pm, online via Zoom
Book your place here.
Save the date for these other upcoming events in the series, details of which will be added to The Mulberry Bush’s website as they are confirmed:
- Friday 20 May 2022
- Friday 17 June 2022
- Friday 15 July 2022
Visit the events and training section of the website here.
50 Years of Early Years Provision
Online via Zoom
An online conference in partnership with The Mulberry Bush Child Care History Network and the Dartington Centre for Social Policy.
These two half day events will highlight and discuss the range of early years provision over the last 50 years, with emphasis on the history of services for BAME communities. We will hear about early years provisions from the 1970’s onwards and understand the links between then and now. This is a pertinent topic as today we are still having discussions regarding the provisions needed for children and their families and caregivers.
Find out more and book your place here.