Overview
John Burnham’s chapter Developments in Social GRRRAAACCEEESSS: visible–invisible and voiced–unvoiced extends the familiar Social GRACES mnemonic (originally with Alison Roper-Hall) and explores how aspects of identity/difference can be visible or invisible and voiced or unvoiced in therapy, supervision, and training. Burnham distinguishes Personal and Social GRRRAAACCEEESSS and offers exercises (e.g., the “collide-scope”) to support reflexivity and curiosity in practice.
What GRRRAAACCEEESSS covers (and why it matters)
Over time the list has expanded (e.g., Gender, Geography, Race, Religion, Age, Ability, Appearance, Class, Culture, Ethnicity, Education, Employment, Sexuality, Sexual orientation, Spirituality). The aim is not a checklist but a lens for noticing which aspects are foregrounded or backgrounded in context, and how power and privilege flow through those shifts.
The two axes at the heart of the chapter
- Visible ↔︎ Invisible: what’s seen or unseen in the room (e.g., age or disability may be visible; class or sexuality may be less so).
- Voiced ↔︎ Unvoiced: what is spoken about versus what remains unspoken (by clients, practitioners, and institutions).
Crossing these axes helps teams ask: What is seen but unspoken? What is unseen yet shaping interaction? It’s a practical scaffold for surfacing blind spots.
Practical tools you can lift into practice
- “Which aspects grab you most?” mapping: notice which GRRRAAACCEEESSS you habitually attend to and which you overlook; plan supervision to rebalance attention.
- Personal vs Social GRRRAAACCEEESSS: reflect on your personal positioning alongside wider cultural discourses and organisational forces.
- The “collide-scope”: expect movement and complexity, not a fixed list—zoom focus in and out across multiple differences as they become relevant.
Quick reference table
| Dimension | Helpful questions | Typical pitfalls |
|---|---|---|
| Visible & Voiced | What’s openly acknowledged in the room? | Over-relying on the obvious; missing quieter influences |
| Visible & Unvoiced | What do we see but avoid naming? | Colluding with silence; lost chances for meaning-making |
| Invisible & Voiced | What’s talked about but not directly observable? | Taking narratives at face value without contextual curiosity |
| Invisible & Unvoiced | What shapes us that we neither see nor say? | Structural power and bias remain unexamined |
Strengths
- Memorable, teachable scaffold: gives teams a shared language to surface difference, bias, and power in ethical, culturally attuned practice.
- Moves beyond “what’s obvious”: the visible–invisible / voiced–unvoiced axes operationalise reflexivity in live supervision.
- Widely used in training/supervision: reported utility for building self-reflexivity and cultural competence in systemic settings.
Limitations and critiques
- Risk of list-thinking: without care, the mnemonic can be treated as a linear checklist that underplays intersectionality; centring power/privilege is essential.
- What’s omitted matters: versions vary; disability/disablism and language may be under-attended unless added deliberately.
- Context-bound categories: items can reflect UK/Western discourses; co-create locally relevant categories with clients/communities to avoid tokenism.
- Evidence gap: strong face validity and pedagogical usefulness, but more empirical work is needed on direct clinical outcomes.
Practice tips
- Begin case discussions with: Which aspects are visible/voiced right now? Which are invisible/unvoiced—and why?
- In supervision, map the quadrants for a case and choose one “unvoiced” area to explore with curiosity and consent.
- Refresh your local list: add language, migration status, neurodivergence, disability/disablism, or other context-specific domains.
Verdict
Burnham’s chapter remains a high-leverage, practice-ready contribution to systemic therapy. Used reflexively (and explicitly situated in power/privilege), GRRRAAACCEEESSS functions as a flexible lens rather than a rigid template—consistently widening curiosity and reducing blind spots.
References (Harvard)
- Burnham, J. (2012) ‘Developments in Social GRRRAAACCEEESSS: visible–invisible and voiced–unvoiced’, in Krause, I-B. (ed.) Culture and Reflexivity in Systemic Psychotherapy: Mutual Perspectives. London: Karnac (Routledge e-book). https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429473463-7
- Totsuka, Y. (2014) ‘‘Which aspects of social GGRRAAACCEEESSS grab you most?’ The social GGRRAAACCEEESSS exercise for a supervision group to promote therapists’ self-reflexivity’, Journal of Family Therapy, 36(S1), pp. 86–106. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-6427.12026
- Birdsey, N. and Kustner, C. (2021) ‘Reviewing the Social GRACES: What Do They Add and Limit in Systemic Thinking and Practice?’, American Journal of Family Therapy, 48(6), pp. 429–442. https://doi.org/10.1080/01926187.2020.1830731