Rehabilitation Facility as a Narrative Device

Reconstruction of a “Story about Transformation” Triggered by Difficulties

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the role of rehabilitation facilities as a place to reconstruct “a story of transformation”. Especially, I focused on the situation where the story was reconstructed in the rehabilitation facilities From November 2014 until April 2016, I conducted a continuous interview survey on 8 girls who are living at X rehabilitation facility. From the result, I found out the following four points. (1) The situation where change of a “story about transformation” is urged is a scene where contradiction arises between the event faced by girls and motivation heightened by correctional education. At this time, it turned out that fluctuations occurred in the positive “story about transformation” reconstructed by correctional education. (2) As an audience in the change of a “story about transformation”, it was revealed that facility staffs play the role of “authentic audience” to appropriately evaluate and support the girls' own power and skills. (3) By encouraging staff to cause “externalization”, they found that it is possible to interpret the problem in relation to the social context. (4) Through experience sharing a new “story about transformation” with the staff, the experience of “downgrading” that occurred in their lives will be positioned in a social context. It can be said that it is a “re-ranking ceremony” that emphasizes the conflict and anguish of the narrator. For juveniles who are still in difficult circumstances, a community is required to operate “re-ranking ceremony” as many times as possible. And the rehabilitation facility could play its role as a story generation device.