Welcome to the Narrative Practice Research Network
For narrative therapy and community work research
The Narrative Practice Research Network is a joint initiative of Dulwich Centre and The University of Melbourne’s Department of Social Work.
We support and promote research about narrative therapy and community work and the use of research methods informed by narrative practice.
We create connections, conversation and collaboration among researchers and practitioners in diverse contexts.
The Narrative Practice Research Network aims to:
Facilitate networking
exchange and collaboration among researchers, and between researchers and practitioners, who share a commitment to narrative practice
Promote innovation
in narrative practice, and share research that will benefit groups and communities facing mental health difficulties as the result of significant hardships
Support development
of narratively informed research methodologies and promote research practices that are congruent with narrative practice ethics and ethos
Extend the evidence base
for narrative therapy and community work (including practice-based evidence)
Nurture the next generation
of postgraduate students and early-career researchers who are working with narrative practice
Provide mentoring
for practitioners and community organisations seeking to undertake research on or with narrative practice.
Latest news
NPRN public seminars in Rwanda: May 2026
We look forward to being inspired and challenged by Professor Bagele Chilisa’s globally renowned postcolonial scholarship. We also look forward to hearing reflections from Rwandan and international scholars, including Dr Jane Awi from the University of Goroka in Papua New Guinea.
Calls for papers
International Family Therapy Association Conference, Adelaide, Australia, 11 to 13 March 2027Call for proposals by 31 October 2026 The International Family Therapy Association (IFTA) Congress
Calls for research participants
Current opportunities to contribute to research projects about narrative therapy and community work.
Online event: Meet the Author with Mark Mulkoff
Dulwich Centre’s Meet the Author session will feature Mark Mulkoff discussing his paper “How might one practice? Producing possibilities through co-research as a daily practice of a minor science”. This paper is from the special issue of The Qualitative Report curated by NPRN.
Launch: special issue of The Qualitative Report on narrative practice and research
The Narrative Practice Research Network is excited to be launching our special issue of The Qualitative Report exploring the generative possibilities of applying narrative therapy and community work to the theory and practice of research.
Online event: In conversation with Professor Bagele Chilisa
Professor Bagele Chilisa is a globally renowned postcolonial scholar, researcher, author and educator who has written extensively about decolonizing research
methodologies. She will be speaking to narrative practitioner-researchers about her work and responding to questions from participants.
Narrative therapy
Narrative therapy and community work centre people as the experts in their own lives. Practitioners seek to elicit the values, abilities, commitments and survival knowledges that people and communities have to get through hard times and reduce the influence of problems in their lives. People join together to co-research the operations of problems in their social contexts.
Narrative Practice Research Groups
The Narrative Practice Research Network welcomes and supports the creation of specialist groups to assist members to connect and collaborate. Groups can have a research focus, be a community of practice or reading group, or facilitate local networking.
