Psychotherapie als „dritter Raum“. Kultursensible Ansätze in der systemischen Familientherapie

Knowledge of a person’s ‘cultural’ background is an important orientation framework for therapeutic practice, providing information about a client’s reference systems, values, norms and worldviews. Insofar as psychotherapists and clients from various cultures with different values, norms and (religious) worldviews meet in psychotherapeutic settings, psychotherapy represents a place where cultural identity is performed and negotiated, a “third space”. Based on the postcolonial theory of the cultural scientist Homi K. Bhabha, the concept of the “third space” will be introduced here in order to theoretically locate the cultural aspect of therapeutic encounters. Case examples from systemic practice will also be used to make an important contribution to a culturally sensitive approach in psychotherapy.