Fanita English has described a specially virulent kind of script message which she calls episcript. Here, a parent conveys an injunction and adds to it the non verbal message: “ I hope this happens to you, so that it wont have to happen to me.”

1. EpiScript

2. Prepared By
Manu Melwin Joy
Research Scholar
School of Management Studies
CUSAT, Kerala, India.
Phone – 9744551114
Mail – manu_melwinjoy@yahoo.com
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3. EpiScript
Fanita English has described a
specially virulent kind of
script message which she calls
episcript. Here, a parent
conveys an injunction and
adds to it the non verbal
message: “ I hope this
happens to you, so that it
wont have to happen to me.”

4. EpiScript
For instance, a mother
scripted with Don’t exist
during her own childhood
may pass a Don’t exist on to
her son or daughter. In her
little professor, the mother
may believe that this buys a
magical release from her own
injunction.

5. EpiScript
At psychological level, she
conveys to her child: “ If
you drop dead, maybe I
wont have to”. Thus the
injunction here is like a
“hot potato” passed on
from generation to
generation.

6. EpiScript
Sometimes, episcript may
take the form of a family
task or family curse, with
every generation supposed
to end up the same way.
Fanita English gives the
example of the young may
who at one time had been
taking psychedelic drugs.

7. EpiScript
He became interested in
psychology, came off the
drugs and started working as
a therapist. However, it soon
became apparent that he
was sabotaging some of his
clients, given them covert
messages that said: “ Crack
up and go into a madhouse.”

8. EpiScript
His supervisor detected his
setup, and the young man
come into therapy himself.
Through the script analysis,
he realized he had received
the command “ Go into a
madhouse” (Don’t be sane)
as a hot potato passed on by
his mother.

9. EpiScript
He had sought to obey
her injunction by taking
drugs. In becoming a
therapist, he had been
trying to pass on the
same hot potato to his
clients.

10. EpiScript
When he and his
therapist explored his
family history, they
found that the same go
crazy episcript had been
handed down through at
least two previous
generations.

11. EpiScript
Nobody had actually
gone into a madhouse.
Each generation believed
it had avoided that
outcome by the magical
device of passing the hot
potato along to someone
else.

12. Thank You

13. Other TA topics available on slideshare
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8. Time Structuring - http://www.slideshare.net/manumjoy/time-structuring.
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