Trauma and Expressive Arts Therapy: Brain, Body, and Imagination in the Healing Process

This seminal book is the defining manual on expressive arts therapy and traumatic stress, deeply informed by neurobiology, research, and decades of clinical practice. It synthesizes the breadth of research on trauma and the brain and presents an innovative, practical framework for treating trauma through the expressive arts. It illustrates how sensory-based and creative strategies support safety, regulation, embodied awareness, resilience, mindfulness, meaning making, and posttraumatic growth.

Rich clinical examples illustrate the use of movement, sound, play, image making, and drama with a wide range of individuals, groups, and communities. Malchiodi’s approach not only enables survivors to express experiences that defy verbalization, but also helps them to transform and integrate the trauma, regain a sense of aliveness, and imagine a new future. Trauma and Expressive Arts Therapy demonstrates how body-based expressive practices have undeniably found their place in the treatment of traumatic stress.

FromTrauma and Expressive Arts Therapy

"Neurobiology has taught us that we need to “come to our senses” in developing effective components for addressing trauma...Expressive arts therapy releases the potential of the senses to “tell the story” of traumatic experiences via nonverbal, implicit forms of communication."

"Expressive arts help people discover just what forms of expression will be self-regulating, communicate their experiences in reparative ways, imagine restorative narratives, and ultimately support recovery."

"The expressive arts have a unique role in restoring a sense of vitality and joy in traumatized individuals because aliveness is not something we can be “talked into.” Instead, it is experienced in both mind and body and particularly on a somatosensory level."

Praise ForTrauma and Expressive Arts Therapy

Bessel A. van der Kolk, MD, author of The Body Keeps the Score; Founder and President, Trauma Research Foundation, Boston, Massachusetts

“This book is at once encyclopedic in scope and profoundly poetic, meticulously observed and heartfelt—as scientific as it is creative. Malchiodi shows us how the legacy of trauma comprises not only distressing memories and disturbing thoughts, but also heartbreaking, gut-wrenching sensory experiences. Throughout history, just about every culture has coped with trauma by activating collective rhythms, sounds, music, improvisation and dramatic enactments, storytelling, and other ways of self-soothing and reconnecting with community. Malchiodi masterfully demonstrates how the expressive arts can mobilize the body and fire the imagination, and thereby help to restore vitality, self-efficacy, mastery, and self-expression.” 

Peter Fonagy, CBE, FMedSci, FBA, FAcSS, Head, Division of Psychology and Language Sciences, University College London, United Kingdom

“For those of us who believe that imagination is at the core of what it is to be human, expressive arts therapies are obvious tools in the process of addressing mental disorders and psychic pain. This book takes a systematic, rigorous, highly informative approach to exploring how therapies that lean on the human ability to create and depict experience can take an individual beyond a history of adversity and trauma. This is the best introduction to expressive arts therapies for trauma that I've seen; it will be of immense value to anyone who is engaged in learning about these interventions or who just wants to find out how and why they can be so very effective.”

Peter A. Levine, PhD, Founder, Somatic Experiencing Trauma Institute, Boulder, Colorado

“We are seeing a momentous shift in therapeutic approaches that help treat distressed individuals—the inclusion of the living, sensing, knowing body. This book offers a vital contribution by incorporating painting, dance, theatre, music, and more into the trauma therapy armamentarium. It is a clear guide both for therapists and educators who already utilize expressive arts and for all those who want to expand their depth of practice.”

Judy Atkinson, PhD, Emeritus Professor and former Head, Gnibi College of Indigenous Australian Peoples, Southern Cross University, Australia

“This is the most important book I have read recently. Malchiodi provides powerful evidence for the significance of the expressive arts in trauma healing, making this an essential resource for all students and practitioners in the helping professions. The volume deepens current theory as well as breaking new ground. It places the individual engaged in creative expression as the authority—or, at the very least, a co-creator with the therapist—in healing action. Malchiodi names the expressive arts as a form of social action, and her book has worldwide relevance across all age levels. This is a brilliant book that builds on what we already know from indigenous therapies—the 'ancient university'—for healing trauma in individuals, families, and communities.”

Janina Fisher, PhD, psychotherapist, consultant, and trainer, Oakland, California

“Malchiodi has written the comprehensive work on trauma treatment and the expressive arts. Moving case descriptions demonstrate the power of images, movement, and music to transform the legacy of the past.”

Doody's Review Service

“This book is thought provoking and reminds us that how and why therapists do what they do can make all the difference in patients achieving health, feelings of safety, and self-efficacy. This well-written contribution to the expressive arts is a must-read….The book is a blend of real-life trauma casework, seminal references and research, and the author’s own honed intuition into patient needs for expression. From beginning to end, objectives are met and readers are left in awe of individuals’ humanness and capacity for resilience when given the right tools and experiences….This book is a delight to read. This author is committed to a process of learning, growing, and becoming positively alive through self-expression. I was left heavy-hearted with real-life story reminders of how brutality can crush the human spirit and experience. Thank goodness the weight was lifted by an innovative exploration into patient/client safety, reparation, and resilience and a brilliant, effective provision of well-thought-out information and activities.”

Tables ofContents

1. Expressive Arts Therapy: Going Beyond the Limits of Language

2. Frameworks for Expressive Arts Therapy and Trauma-Informed Practice

3. A Brain–Body Framework for Expressive Arts Therapy

4. The Reparation Is in the Relationship

5. Safety: The Essential Foundation

6. Self-Regulation: Fundamentals of Stabilization

7. Working with the Body’s Sense of Trauma

8. Trauma Narratives: Multiple Layers of Storied Expression

9. Resilience: Enhancing and Embodying Mastery and Competence

10. Meaning Making: Imagining New Narratives for Brain and Body

Resources

Appendix 1A. Body Outline Template: Adults

Appendix 1B. Body Outline Template: Children

Appendix 2. Brain Template: Profile View

Appendix 3. Brain Template: Two Hemispheres

Appendix 4. Breathing Prompts

Appendix 5. Mock Body-Mapping Activity

Appendix 6. Body-Mapping Template