Dissertation - World Federation of Music Therapy

therapists. Open and attentive listening is the (only) gate to a thorough understanding
of music's enormous existential and therapeutic potential.
3.7 Metaphor and narrative in BMGIM 40
This section is an examination of the various ways in which BMGIM utilizes
metaphor and narrative as means of self-transformation. First a possible
neuropsychological framework for the understanding of images and metaphors is
referenced, and then follows the unfolding of a semantic and narrative understanding,
based on the theories presented earlier in this chapter. Awareness of metaphorical
imagery types and levels is relevant both theoretically and clinically, and narrative
theory may be an important contribution to further development of the theoretical
framework of BMGIM.
3.7.1 A neuropsychological framework
Perilli (2002) examined the specific role played by the metaphor in the BMGIM
process. She presents a cognitive and neuropsychologically based understanding of
the metaphoric process and the development of the metaphor as originating from the
functioning of the body in interaction with its environment. This environmental
adjustment develops as embodied imaginative schemas, including temporal schemas
of durations, frequencies and intensity of intra- and interpersonal experiences. Several
research studies have demonstrated that sounds and music both stimulate the
formation of and evoke existing imaginative schemas that are embodied at the
neuropsychological level, because music presents varied sensory, emotional and
motor components that stimulate activity in cortical and subcortical areas and relate to
components of the imaginative schemas evoked. These schemas in turn furnish a
reference point and foundation for all metaphorical processes, including the creation
40 This section is based on Bonde (2000), the article Metaphor and Narrative in Guided Imagery and
Music (BMGIM) published in the Journal of the Association of Music and Imagery Vol. 7, 2000 , p. 59-
76. The article has the following abstract: The paper suggests a hermeneutical framework for the
understanding of the imagery in BMGIM, based on theories of narrative expression and understanding.
The author discusses how the four phases of the BMGIM session have specific metaphorical tasks, and
he identifies three levels within the therapeutic narrative of BMGIM: 1) The basic level of the core
metaphor, the discovery of hidden meaning through the imagery; 2) The level of metaphors of ego and
Self, the discovery of the client's personal voice; 3) The narrative level of joined metaphors, the
discovery of plots and other configurations in the client's imagery and life story. The three levels are
illustrated by clinical examples and references to the BMGIM literature.
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