Subversive Dialogues

by Laura S. Brown

Building on the revolutionary work of feminist scholars who have described how women employ strategies of knowing the world in a manner distinct from men, Laura S. Brown, noted for her pioneering work in the field of ethics and boundaries, shows how these insights should reshape the very nature of the therapeutic encounter. Therapy must be understood as an opportunity to help clients see the relationships between their behavior and the patriarchal society in which we are all embedded. Viewed in this light, feminist therapy affords both practitioner and client a chance to subvert the system in which women's lives have been devalued. This powerful vision of feminist therapy is grounded throughout with case examples that illustrate how a dialogue between therapist and client can be healing, subversive, and transformative all at once.