Between Fathers and Sons

Explore the tensions and tenderness between fathers and sons in this masterpiece of narrative psychology!"We live in a story-shaped world," as the editors say, and Between Fathers and Sons: Critical Incident Narratives in the Development of Men's Lives shows how the stories we construct come to shape our perceptions of the world and of ourselves. The incidents recounted here are more than just moving, funny, or painful stories of fathers and sons. Each is a myth that helped form the authors'social and moral identity. This blend of feeling and intellect, story and analysis makes Between Fathers and Sons a work of art as well as a work of psychology. The contributors--many of them pioneers of narrative therapy--bring unique insight to bear on their own stories. Using a broad array of narrative forms, from the soliliquy to the multiple narrator, they explore and analyze themes of silence, mystery, respect, sports, self-reliance, and longing for continuity.In the stories you will find in Between Fathers and Sons: - a father's disappointed silence is transformed as it resonates through four generations - a Korean immigrant faces the differences between his ideals of fatherhood and his son's American view - a father-son fishing trip ends with the biggest fish ever--or no fish at all - betrayed by his stepfather, a boy seeks guidance from stories of his dead father - a Baptist preacher helps his son make an agonizing choice - a grown man's memory of a childhood event gives him new insight into his father's identity and their relationship Between Fathers and Sons is a landmark volume in father-son relationships and in narrative therapy. It is destined to become a classic in the field.

Pellegrini, Robert J; Sarbin, Theodore R

Contents - About the Editors - Contributors - Chapter 1. General Introduction - From a Story to a Book - Rationale, Objectives, and Method - Contemporary Sociocultural Context - The Essays - And Just One More Thing - Chapter 2. Sons and Fathers: The Storied Nature of Human Relationships - Genres - Style and Content - Sacred Stories - Three Perspectives - Section I. Identity Stories - Chapter 3. I Am Older Than My Father - Chapter 4. Remembering the Origins of a Constructivist Psychologist - Chapter 5. Teaching by Doing - Chapter 6. Every Kid Deserves a Chance - Being There - Chapter 7. Responsibilities - Chapter 8. On Coming to Understand My Father: A Personal and Professional Journey - The Emotional Relationship with My Father - What Relations to My Work? - Conclusion - Section II. Stories of Emotional Life - Chapter 9. The One That Got Away--Or Did It? - Mark's Story - Richard's Story - A Conversation Between Father and Son - Chapter 10. Learning to Appreciate the Sublime: Don't Knock the Rock - Chapter 11. Remembering My Father - Context - Elaborating the Memory - On Fathers and Sons - The Twenty-First Century - Anchoring Across - Coda - Chapter 12. Blessed Be the Name of the Father: Generational Exercises - Kenneth Gergen: On Relations with My Father - John Stanford Gergen: Life with My Father - Chase Martini: On Relations with My Father - Spanning the Generations: Beyond the Silence - Chapter 13. Their Way - Chapter 14. In Absentia - Section III. Stories of Self-Understanding - Chapter 15. The Presence of What is Missing: Memory, Poetry, and the Ride Home - Chapter 16. Paternal Role Slippage Across Cultures - Critical Incident - Father-Son Relationship As Culture-Bound - Resolution - Chapter 17. To Tell the Secrets of My Prison House - Chapter 18. My Measure, My Guide, and Still a Mystery - Small-Town Preacher, in Motion - Father As Teacher and Taskmaster - A Critical Piece of Advice - Sequelae - Epilogue - Chapter 19. Farewell to Vienna: The Authority of Nostalgia - Epilogue - Index - Reference Notes Included