The Tavistock Learning Group

Exploration Outside the Traditional Frame

In The Tavistock Learning Group: Exploration Outside the Traditional Frame, the authors attempt to expand the heuristic, theoretical, and applied dimensions of Group Relations paradigms by pairing classical Group Relations concepts with typically non-Tavistock psychology paradigms and social sciences concepts. Under the broad domain of psychologically-informed constructs, Lacanian psychoanalysis, existential philosophy and bioenergetics are applied. Under a somewhat broader range of social science conceptualization, the capacity for abstraction is linked with anti-work in groups, the large group is re-imagined as an extension of community dynamics and dysfunction, and the role of symbol systems, symbology and semiotics are examined in relation to sophisticated work groups. Lastly, non-Tavistock models of group development and conceptualization are re-interpreted and explained using a group-as-a-whole framework.