Therapeutic Ways with Words

Most people know that therapists listen to people discuss their problems, and that they are paid for their services. Yet few people who have not undergone therapy know what actually goes on in these sessions, or have any idea about how talking to a stranger can be beneficial to one's mental health. What is therapeutic about therapeutic discourse? Why is the therapy hour such a powerful influence in peoples' lives if all they do is talk? Who talks, and what about?

To answer some of these questions from a linguistic stand-point, Kathleen Ferrara analyses samples of psychotherapeutic discourse between several therapists and their clients. She focuses on cohesion and the joint construction of digalogue to get at her main concern of just how talk can be therapeutic, and at the same time addresses recent concerns in the study of conversation. Her thesis is that repetition and continuity are resources of language which speakers can recombine in various ways to create meaning within a given social context, and she looks at the many ways these cohesive devices are used in therapy speech.

Therapeutic Ways with Words should appeal not only to linguists and people concerned with language in the professions, but to the large audience connected to psychotherapy.

'The scholarship reflected in the manuscript is not just sound, but creative; not just up-to-date, but up to the minute. Ferrara offers insightful treatments of data just begging for attention in light of recent developments in discourse analysis, and thus contributes cutting-edge results ... It represents the kind of research we need much more of in linguistics today."

Neal Norrick, Professor of English-Linguistics, Northern Illinois University