The Linked Self in Psychoanalysis


Book Description

Enrique Pichon Rivière was a pioneering Argentinian psychoanalyst, writing in Spanish in the middle of the twentieth century. His work has inspired not only succeeding generations of Latin American analysts, but also spawned the fields of analytic family therapy, dynamic group work and organizational consultation. This book presents Pichon Rivière’s groundbreaking work in English for the first time.




Remains of a Self


Book Description

From the twentieth century in the twenty-first, psychoanalysis and deconstruction have challenged, and continue to challenge, our conceptions of subjectivity and selfhood. Psychoanalysis revealed that even in our innermost households we are never quite alone; rather, instances of “otherness” incessantly interfere in our most intimate relation to ourselves, forcing us to adapt continuously. Deconstruction, inheriting both this psychoanalytic disclosure and Heidegger’s destruction of the history of metaphysics, went to the foundations of the Western constructions of “the subject” and “the self,” only to find how a destabilizing otherness was always already haunting them. What, if anything, remains of the self in the aftermath? Early on in the wake of deconstruction, a certain misconceived and simplified notion of the “death of the subject” was proclaimed and in recent years more or less successful attempts have been made at reviving the notions of “the subject,” “the self,” and “agency.” In contrast to these attempts at revival, this book offers a two-pronged approach: On the one hand, it argues that neither psychoanalysis nor deconstruction propounds a simple annihilation of the subject or liquidation of the self; on the other hand, however, neither do they pave the way for a “return to the subject” or “resurrection of the self” that would allow us once again to become confident about our presence to ourselves. Instead, this book suggests that if we set ourselves the task of taking up the heritage from psychoanalysis and deconstruction in a serious manner, we are obliged to retrace the subject and the self as undergoing perpetual auto-deconstruction.




Self and Other


Book Description

In Self and Other, Robert Rogers presents a powerful argument for the adoption of a theory of object relations, combining the best features of traditional psychoanalytic theory with contemporary views on attachment behavior and intersubjectivity. Rogers discusses theory in relation both to actual psychoanalytic case histories and imagined selves found in literature, and provides a critical rereading of the case histories of Freud, Winnicott, Lichtenstein, Sechehaye, and Bettelheim. At once scientific and humanistic, Self and Other engagingly draws from theoretical, clinical, and literary traditions. It will appeal to psychoanalysts as well as to literary scholars interested in the application of psychoanalysis to literature.




Self and Emotional Life


Book Description

Adrian Johnston and Catherine Malabou defy theoretical humanities' deeply-entrenched resistance to engagements with the life sciences. Rather than treat biology and its branches as hopelessly reductive and politically suspect, they view recent advances in neurobiology and its adjacent scientific fields as providing crucial catalysts to a radical rethinking of subjectivity. Merging three distinct disciplines—European philosophy from Descartes to the present, Freudian-Lacanian psychoanalysis, and affective neuroscience—Johnston and Malabou triangulate the emotional life of affective subjects as conceptualized in philosophy and psychoanalysis with neuroscience. Their experiments yield different outcomes. Johnston finds psychoanalysis and neurobiology have the potential to enrich each other, though affective neuroscience demands a reconsideration of whether affects can be unconscious. Investigating this vexed issue has profound implications for theoretical and practical analysis, as well as philosophical understandings of the emotions. Malabou believes scientific explorations of the brain seriously problematize established notions of affective subjectivity in Continental philosophy and Freudian-Lacanian analysis. She confronts philosophy and psychoanalysis with something neither field has seriously considered: the concept of wonder and the cold, disturbing visage of those who have been affected by disease or injury, such that they are no longer affected emotionally. At stake in this exchange are some of philosophy's most important claims concerning the relationship between the subjective mind and the objective body, the structures and dynamics of the unconscious dimensions of mental life, the role emotion plays in making us human, and the functional differences between philosophy and science.




Psychoanalysis and the Birth of the Self


Book Description

This book draws psychoanalysis out of unsubstantiated, hermeneutic speculation and into the science and philosophy of the Self. Mark Leffert offers a survey of where we as human beings come from, going back into prehistory and our development as individuals. Psychoanalysis and the Birth of the Self is written to provide psychoanalysts with interdisciplinary information drawn from fields that they may have had little access to. Leffert undertakes a novel integration of topics not frequently discussed together, resulting in a radical critique of the theorization of psychoanalysis. The book begins by setting the story with a short analysis of the history of psychoanalysis. A new science has been founded on the recognition of the impossibility of separating evolution from development; it is called Evo-Devo. Applied to the human condition, it integrates development with palaeoanthropology and forms the basis for exploring such topics as the neurophilosophy of consciousness, the birth of the Self, and its neurodevelopment. It includes epigenetics in the conversation. Leffert then takes a radical turn, integrating the biological Evo-Devo of the Self with the study of its Existence that is, Existentialism and Phenomenology. The integration of these two threads, Evo-Devo and Existentialism offers a powerful and unique tool for exploring the Self. The author offers an innovative way of understanding an individual that pulls together their biology, their development, and the way they choose to exist in the world. It steps outside of the traditional ways of clinically understanding an individual not by abandoning them but rather by powerfully supplementing them. Psychoanalysis and the Birth of the Self offers a novel, interdisciplinary braiding of disparate strands of knowledge that will be of interest to psychoanalysts as well as those in the disciplines of neuroscience, existentialism and phenomenology, and anthropology.




The Private Self


Book Description

The concept of the self is the subject of intense debate in psychoanalysis - as it is in neuro-science, cognitive science, and philosophy. In The Private Self Arnold Modell, a leading thinker in American psychoanalysis, studies selfhood from the inside by examining variations on the theme of the self in Freud and in the work of object relations theorists, self psychologists, and neuro-scientists. His significant contribution is an interdisciplinary perspective in formulating a theory of the private self. Modell contends that the self is fundamentally paradoxical in that it is both dependent and autonomous - dependent upon social affirmation, but autonomous in generating itself from within: we create ourselves by selecting values that are endowed with private meanings. (Modell presents an extensive view of these self-generative and self-creative aspects.) The private self is an embodied self: the psychology of the self is rooted in biology. By thinking of the unconscious as a neurophysiological process and the self as the subject and object of its own experience, Modell is able to explain how identity can persist in the flux of consciousness. In arriving at his unique synthesis of psychoanalytic observations and neurobiological theory, Modell draws on the contributions of Donald Winnicott in psychoanalysis, William James in philosophy, and Gerald Edelman in neurobiology. The Private Self boldly explores the frontier between psychoanalysis and biology. In replacing the "instinct-driven" self and the "attachment-oriented" self with the "self-generating" self, the author offers an exciting and original perspective for our understanding of the mind and the brain.




Self and Others


Book Description

Self and Others is addressed to students and practitioners of psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy. Its 19 chapters are divided into five evenly balanced parts. The first rubric, "Self, Others, and Ego," introduces us to the units of the intersubjective constitution we have come to know as object relations theory. The second rubric, "Developing Object Relations," is a confluence of lessons derived from infant studies and the psychotherapeutic process, specifically from the work of Mahler and Kernberg. Third, Hamilton integrates into an "Object Relations Continuum" Mahler's developmental stages and organizational series with nosological entities and levels of personality organization. Under the penultimate rubric, "Treatment," levels of object relatedness and types of psychopathology are grounded in considerations of technique in treatment, and generous clinical vignettes are provided to illustrate the technical issues cited. Last, the rubric of "Broader Contexts" takes object relations theory out of the consulting room into application areas that include folklore, myth, and transformative themes on the self, small and large groups, applications of object relations theory outside psychoanalysis, and the evolutionary history and politics of object relations theory. This volume thus presents an integrative theory of object relations that links theory with practice. But, more than that, Hamilton accomplishes his objective of delineating an integrative theory that is quite free of rivalry between schools of thought. An indispensable contribution to beginning psychoanalytic candidates and other practitioners as well as those who wish to see the application of object relations theories to fields outside of psychoanalysis. —Psychoanalytic Books: A Quarterly Journal of Reviews A Jason Aronson Book




Psychoanalysis and Buddhism


Book Description

"Psychoanalysis and Buddhism" pairs Buddhist psychotherapists together with leading figures in psychoanalysis who have a general interest in the role of spirituality in psychology. The resulting essays present an illuminating discourse on these two disciplines and how they intersect. This landmark book challenges traditional thoughts on psychoanalysis and Buddhism and propels them to a higher level of understanding.




Freud and Beyond


Book Description

The classic, in-depth history of psychoanalysis, presenting over a hundred years of thought and theories Sigmund Freud's concepts have become a part of our psychological vocabulary: unconscious thoughts and feelings, conflict, the meaning of dreams, the sensuality of childhood. But psychoanalytic thinking has undergone an enormous expansion and transformation since Freud's death in 1939. With Freud and Beyond, Stephen A. Mitchell and Margaret J. Black make the full scope of twentieth century psychoanalytic thinking-from Harry Stack Sullivan to Jacques Lacan; D.W. Winnicott to Melanie Klein-available for the first time. Richly illustrated with case examples, this lively, jargon-free introduction makes modern psychoanalytic thought accessible at last.




Self-examination in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy


Book Description

Self-examination in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy provides open and intimate accounts of the experience of being in psychotherapy. The internal life of the therapist is as much at the heart of the stories told as those of the clients. William F. Cornell here writes in a more personal and literary voice, avoiding as much as possible, the dense theoretical language that often typifies analytic writing. Central to the thesis elaborated in this book is that of how the therapist’s own personal history and unconscious motivations can deepen or distort the therapist’s understanding of the client. One chapter is devoted to the frank discussion of the author’s work with a client that was not only unhelpful but in fact harmful. Cornell emphasizes the capacity to call one’s self into question as a fundamental outcome of psychotherapy and psychoanalysis. Attention is paid to the conscious and unconscious forces that create profound dynamic tensions between the enlivening desire for a fuller life and the defenses that deaden one’s capacity to think and to engage more fully in one’s life and relationships. The dynamics of transgenerational transmission of grief, loss, and trauma are also examined closely. The psychotherapist as person and professional, rather than the clients, is at the heart of this book. Self-examination in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy will appeal to all psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists who will find an exceptionally open discussion of the challenges, learning, and meanings of being a psychotherapist.