| Abstract: | A short exchange from a family therapy treatment with a couple is analyzed in detail according to what the speakers, in this case husband and therapist, do with each other and with the third participant, the wife, in making their utterances. They are seen to be performing a number of different acts with each utterance and an attempt is made to connect these acts with the actual linguistic properties of the utterances used; in this connection the semantic-pragmatic function of the operator, “just,” in one particular reading is discussed. These acts receive further support when the wider linguistic and situational context is considered. The exchange is of linguistic interest because the response of the therapist to the husband seems to be a non sequitur. It is shown, however, that pragmatic coherence, i.e., coherence with respect to the sequence of linguistic acts and moves between the speakers in the given situation, forces an interpretation of the two utterances as a connected text. The exchange is interesting therapeutically because the therapist's intervention brings immediate change in the husband. This striking therapeutic effect is attributed to the restructuring character of the intervention which sufficiently shifts the balance in the relationship between husband and wife. An analysis of the linguistic properties of the therapist's utterance shows that the restructuring is achieved by particular syntactic, semantic and pragmatic features of the utterance. It turns out that restructuring, as manipulative as it may appear on the surface, is a highly complex, sophisticated and powerful technique. It is not peculiar to family therapy; comparable procedures can be found in other forms of psychotherapy, e.g., psychoanalysis and client-centered therapy, and in general in everyday conversation situations where it is necessary for one speaker to get another speaker to modify what he is saying and to adopt a different view. |
