Group Analysis, Ahead of Print.
‘Show and tell’ is a primary school activity wherein a child shows an object to the class and tells a story about it. I use this metaphor to understand group communication, with reference to Foulkes’ communicative hierarchy. I define ‘showing’ as bottom-up communication, which presents an object in search of a containing narrative. Conversely, ‘telling’ is formalized as top-down communication, providing a container in search of an object. I am concerned with what might happen, so-to-speak, if a child were to bring an object to the class only to sit in silence, or were to tell a story without bringing an object. With reference to clinical material from an analytic group, I describe instances of both kinds of communicative mismatch. I propose that the therapeutic work of the group balances showing with telling and vice versa, and in so doing fosters a more ‘joined up’ communication amongst the participants. Here, the conductor does well to have in mind an aphorism from creative writing: ‘show, don’t tell’.