Art therapists hold a unique position to facilitate healing during a time of intense sociopolitical trauma. The current U.S. political climate is causing harm to marginalized groups, which necessitates an intentional exploration of how art therapists hold and wield power and privilege and how this can affect client outcomes. In this article, I…

Research suggests that the arts can have a positive impact on youth development, from birth through adolescence. This review explores recent research on arts-based programs and arts therapies. Programs were considered arts-based if at least one of the main components was an arts-related activity, or if there was a deliberate use of arts in the…

Laurie Halse Anderson's young adult novel "Speak" concerns the rape and subsequent silence of ninth grade protagonist Melinda Sordino. By relying on extensive literary allusions involving trees, rape, silence, and transformation, Anderson creates a young adult problem novel that is both of the moment and timeless in its themes. The…

With growing trends toward preventative, community-based health care, art therapists must expand their scope of practice beyond the medical model and individual psychodynamics in order to serve, include, and empower those in need. In this article the authors review literature that illustrates the unique qualities art therapists can contribute to…

The process of determining permanent living arrangements for children residing in foster care is referred to as permanency planning. I provide a preliminary framework for art therapists working with foster children and their families during the permanency planning process, and identify clinical and ethical issues that have resulted from the…

Therapeutic doll making can hold diverse functions for clients in therapy, particularly for those clients who are working through complex trauma histories. Recent literature pertaining to the treatment of complex trauma suggests that talking treatments have their limits; supplementary therapeutic approaches that focus on sensory, physical,…

The Check ("Check, Change What You Need To Change and/or Keep What You Want") art therapy protocol is a sequence of directives for treating trauma that is grounded in neurobiological theory and designed to facilitate trauma narrative processing, autobiographical coherency, and the rebalancing of dysregulated responses to psychosocial…

This article explores the dynamics of orphaned children's engagement with art therapy in a group of preadolescent children living in a Russian orphanage. The phenomenon of repetition compulsion (i.e., origins in past traumatic experiences, destructive consequences, and protective psychic function) is discussed with respect to the children's…