墨尔本大学

The Master of Narrative Therapy and Community Work is a postgraduate specialist qualification for professionals interested in enhancing their clinical and practice-research skills.

Narrative therapy is a respectful, non-blaming approach to counselling and community work, which centres people as the experts in their own lives. It views problems as separate from people and assumes people have many skills, competencies, beliefs, values, commitments and abilities that will assist them to reduce the influence of problems in their lives.

Narrative approaches to therapy and community work are used by social workers, psychologists, community development workers, nurses, teachers, doctors, and other health professionals in a wide range of practice settings.

The degree is delivered as a joint initiative of the Department of Social Work (The University of Melbourne) and The Dulwich Centre, Adelaide. The Dulwich Centre is an international centre for narrative therapy training, established by internationally-renowned social worker and narrative therapist Michael White in 1984.

Who is this course for?

This course is designed for counselling and community work professionals with an undergraduate degree and at least two years experience in their field who wish to utilise methods of narrative therapy in their practice.

Graduates have come from Singapore, Canada, China, Australia, Spain, Hong Kong, Israel, Tanzania, Ireland, Chile, South Africa, Denmark, Mexico, New Zealand and the UK.

The Master of Narrative Therapy and Community Work is a collaboration between the University of Melbourne (Department of Social Work) and Dulwich Centre. It’s a practice-based program, with a wide-range of national and international teachers. It’s been specifically designed to spark continual innovation in the field.

Intended learning outcomes

This course prepares graduates for narrative therapy and community work.

The course:

• Provides graduates with the theoretical and advanced skill base for working with narrative approaches with individuals, families and communities across the life course, particularly in the areas of trauma and recovery.
• Prepares graduates for narrative practice in diverse cultural contexts
• Introduces the specific theories and advanced skills of narrative therapy
• Engages students in critical reflection of their own practice development
• Engages students in practice research and writing for publication.