Gender, Sexuality and Power in Groups

Abstract

In this paper I draw on issues posed by an experiential women's group, first, to explore relations between women in groups and, second, to highlight how gendered institutional dynamics enter into relations of desire and authority between women. Reviewing current literature on women, gender and groups, I discuss the absence of discussion of the erotic (including the homoerotic) within groups - including women's groups and how this connects with questions of agency, power and knowledge. The gendering of power and authority and its reflections within group processes is also considered. Two contrasting representations emerging from the group material, the `experienced lesbian' and the `murderous doctor', are then analysed as indicative of the range of available transferential positions in which the (woman) group conductor can be located. It is argued, first, that such broader consideration of women's positions within group processes promotes exploration of the multiple and diverse forms of sexed/gendered relations within groups. Second, that these relations may transcend actual sex/gendered positions, whereby, third, attending to such institutionally gendered power dynamics accords with group analysis as an arena connecting individual, familial and broader cultural relations, and in which transformative relations can be prefigured.

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