By Steven Kuchuck (USA), Ilana Laor (Israel), Dan Friedlander (Israel), and Tami Dror-Schieber (Israel)
The 17th annual IARPP International Conference will be held in Tel Aviv-Jaffa (Yafo), Israel from June 20 through 23, 2019. Together with the International Conference Committee, we are excited to put together a rich and creative program with the theme, “Imagining with Eyes Wide Open: Relational Journeys.” Imagination lies at the core of our lives as well as our clinical work. We invite presenters from all around the world to come to Tel Aviv and share their clinical work and thinking about relational journeys into imagination.
In accordance with IARPP tradition, the plenary sessions of the conference will offer creative and varied viewpoints on our theoretical, clinical, and outside worlds, our patients, and ourselves. These will be followed by facilitated group discussions offering relational processing of the conference.
Additionally, we invite all of you to submit paper and panel proposals on various topics and diverse clinical experiences. We encourage papers on challenging issues arising in your treatment rooms and/or inspired by the upcoming conference’s location. The deadline for submitting proposals is October 8. For more information and to submit proposals please click here: https://iarpp.net/web/iarpp-conference-2019-call-for-papers/.
We are, of course, well aware of not only the educational and healing potential of imagination but also the conflicts that give rise to or emerge as a result of imagination. We are therefore featuring invited panels that will refer to and reflect upon these dimensions. On a related note, we are aiming to include presentations by Arab and Palestinian colleagues and others who are working with unique, and in some cases integrated, populations and communities in Israel. And, as always, there will be pre-conference workshops and hopefully field visits designed to inform and enrich participants’ learning experiences.
We are aware that the location of the conference in Israel has aroused opposition among some IARPP members. We invite these individuals in particular to consider taking part in this conference if at all possible, in order to dialogue and see – firsthand, with their own eyes – the multi-denominational Israeli cultural context in all its beauty, conflict, struggle, and pain. We understand that for some of you this is much easier said than done. We will do our very best to address and even directly handle visa approvals, including personal negotiations with the political authorities if needed. Disagreements and differences of opinion are part of the relational discourse, and all IARPP members as well as other mental health professionals are welcome to come and make their contributions to the common clinical discourse.
As co-chairs of the IARPP 2019 conference, we warmly invite you to join us, and encourage you to spread the word among your colleagues.
For more information about this conference please visit our website,
https://iarpp.net/web/conference/iarpp-conference-2019-tel-aviv/
See you in Tel Aviv!
Steven Kuchuck, DSW
Ilana Laor, PhD
Dan Friedlander, MA
Tami Dror-Schieber, MA
Conference Co-chairs
