Dr Lisa Margetts is an Honorary Research Fellow for the Department of Education, University of Roehampton. She has published and presented widely on the subject of international development work in music therapy. Lisa previously created and managed the music therapy service for a prominent UK charity supporting learning disabled adults.
This presentation will describe and discuss inter-cultural doctoral research undertaken at Children’s Rehabilitation Centre Minsk, Belarus that responded to a locally identified need to develop relationships with children with complex needs. At the centre was a newly designed staff training course, based on Winnicott’s (1960) theory of holding, as practised by UK psychodynamic music therapists, that enabled engagement with a process of emotional change in relation to children with complex needs. This facilitated understanding of behaviours as the communication of feelings. The strong theoretical underpinning promoted cognitive awareness of this process based on the development of musical skills.
