The Role of Community in Meaning Making: Storytelling in Expressive Arts Therapy With Narrative and Traumatic Memory in Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault

Author

Jennifer MurphyFollow

Date of Award

Spring 5-22-2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

MA - Master of Arts

Department

Expressive Therapies

Advisor

Dr. Ara Parker

Abstract

This literature review examines the concept of body as home in terms of privilege versus human right. This thesis is a literature review examining the repercussions of the traumatized mind, body, nervous system, memory, and soul. This thesis discusses the literature in five sections, and through them, the urgency of community, of healing relationally is strengthened and suggested for future research and treatment interventions. This capstone thesis discusses the relationship between narrative and traumatic memory in expressive arts therapy and the role of storytelling in making meaning relationally. Meaning-making reorients us to our traumatic memories to reframe them in a more integrated way into our explicit memory with more ease and comprehension, thus enabling us to find ourselves in community once again. In my research, I sought information that brought to the forefront the tension in holding the dichotomy between community and isolation, with the reality in mind that being traumatized makes it excruciating, if not intolerable, to exist communally. Through relationship, the polarizing tensions of trauma and community are alleviated when we seek to make meaning in our lives as a way of getting from one place to another within ourselves. The work explained in this thesis is humanistic and expressive and honors what it took to survive. This literature review was written to present how, through storytelling in expressive arts therapy in community, a survivor can reclaim their body as their own and inhabit it wholly after trauma pervades it.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Recommended Citation

Murphy, Jennifer, "The Role of Community in Meaning Making: Storytelling in Expressive Arts Therapy With Narrative and Traumatic Memory in Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault" (2021). Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses. 420.
https://digitalcommons.lesley.edu/expressive_theses/420