Continental Psychoanalysis

Freud’s discussion of uncanny [unheimlich] experiences focuses on their peculiar ambivalence. On his view, the uncanny is a paradoxical feeling of both familiarity and alienation. While Freud’s analysis of this paradoxical feeling does succeed in explaining it away, it does little to explain it. One might expect a psychoanalytical demystification of the real experience that is hidden behind the superstitious overtones of uncanny experiences. Instead, the uncanny is attributed rather anti- climactically to the combination of a previous superstition (maintained unconsciously) (...) and an entirely coincidental verification of that superstition. The implication is that there is no uncanny per se. There is no distinctive category of experience, the unique character of which tends to cause or encourage superstitious beliefs; rather, such beliefs are prerequisite to having the experience. In other words, the experience suits the belief, and not vice-versa. The uncanny is the fantasized verification of a repressed fantasy. It involves a breakdown of the reality principle and the projection of beliefs into the external world, rather than a peculiarity of feeling that can be linked intrinsically to a specific category of experience. I do not intend to reject this analysis in its entirety. The basic structure, repression and return, is sound. However, Freud’s analysis of the uncanny, which resolves uncanny ambivalence into the separate categories of consciousness and unconsciousness, merely reinstates the problematical opposition of das heimliche and das unheimliche, familiar and unfamiliar, within the mind rather than in the external world. The coincidence of the two feelings in uncanny experience cannot be explained without an intervening stage between repression and return. I will suggest that Freud’s characterization of uncanniness as the return, in superstition, of the repressed is a misplacement of the experience of uncanniness. The aesthetical feeling is the cause of, but not identical to, the projected superstitions and ideas which surround it. An explanation of the feeling of uncanniness must fall not on the side of the repressed, but on the side of consciousness. The import of my position is that the feeling of uncanniness refers, in a manner of speaking, to something “real,” rather than merely to infantile ideas projected upon the external world. Freud’s explanation makes the unconscious a kind of scapegoat to be blamed for imposing fundamentally irrational beliefs into our interpretation of present experience, in that way preserving a model of the conscious ego as autonomous, fundamentally attuned to reality and ultimately independent of the unconscious. I will argue, on the contrary, that the experience of the uncanny is not merely a falling back into irrational or infantile beliefs, but an experience of a deep disunity in personhood that rightly causes us to question our everyday confidence in the unity, independence, and rationality of our conscious sense of self. The ambivalence of the feeling has its source in an irresolvable ambivalence that can exist in consciousness, and not simply in an analytically resolvable psychical ambivalence between consciousness and the unconscious. (shrink)

This paper investigates the significance of filmic analysis in the contemporary theoretical paradigm inspired by Slavoj Žižek, which we term ‘Transcendental Materialism’. After characterising its distinct peculiarities within the history of psychoanalysis and film theory, we demonstrate the limitations of previous (possible) answers, arguing they are partly formulated in response to confrontations with other paradigms. Our own approach is then informed by a study of another popular object of analysis in Transcendental Materialism – the joke. We show how Freud’s understanding (...) of the joke was adapted by the paradigm and supported further by certain philosophical insights by (among others) G.W.F. Hegel. Finally, we demonstrate how parallels can be drawn between this adaptation and the significance of the filmic form within Transcendental Materialism, inspired in part by Alain Badiou’s reading of Hegel. (shrink)

The tension between the sense-content of the idea and its scientifically proven objectivity reaches its climax in the plainly expressed claim. However, science is free neither from metaphors nor from rhetorical figures that provide a framework for interpretation, such as paradigm, model, analogy, and so on. In other words, the findings need to be accommodated in order to be received and are not otherwise communicated. [...] The hope of the editors is to offer the reader, thanks to all the contributors, (...) a textbook of quality and relevance, and perhaps a particular input to challenge and find what is given by revealing itself and/or oneself. (shrink)

A crucial philosophical problem of social robots is how much they perform a kind of sociality in interacting with humans. Scholarship diverges between those who sustain that humans and social robots cannot by default have social interactions and those who argue for the possibility of an asymmetric sociality. Against this dichotomy, we argue in this paper for a holistic approach called “Δ phenomenology” of HSRI. In the first part of the paper, we will analyse the semantics of an HSRI. This (...) is what leads a human being to assign or receive a meaning of sociality by interacting with a social robot. Hence, we will question the ontological structure underlying HSRIs, suggesting that HSRIs may lead to a peculiar kind of user alienation. By combining all these variables, we will formulate some final recommendations for an ethics of social robots. (shrink)

Beginning with Freud’s treatment of identification as an ambivalent process, we explore identification’s polarization between narcissistic idealization and melancholic division. While narcissistic identification can be seen as a strategy adopted by the ego to avoid the educational development of its drives and to maintain itself either in whole or in part in an infantile state, melancholic identification activates a tension between the ego-ideal and the real ego at the expense of the latter. After discussing the ambivalence of identification, we review (...) Freud’s discussion of mass formations as group identifications, arguing that the work of facilitating a productive sublimation of the drives cannot be reduced to a strengthening of the artificial masses represented by social institutions such as the church and the educational system. Instead, the difference between mass formations allowing for collective sublimation and those suffering from narcissistic or melancholic blockages must be found in the productive qualities of the mass itself. In closing, we outline a few ways in which we might begin to understand the political contribution of masses to the maturation of human drives. (shrink)

This paper briefly describes the life of Otte Gross and his thoughts on sexuality, society, and repression. This provides the basis to interpret the #MeToo movement as functioning in the same way as a repressed memory that breaks through to consciousness. Gross' suggestion that society "rapes" individuals and his assertion of a primordial matriarchal society are useful insights in understanding the #Metoo movement.

Når politikere truer kontanthjælpsmodtagere, flygtninge forvises til teltlejre, og vi skal assimileres til bestemt dansk kultur, er det den samme voldelige struktur, der reproduceres, når forældre begår vold mod børn. Psykoanalysen forklarer sammenhængen mellem institutionel vold og vold i relationer.

Other people figure in our experience of the world; they strike us as unique and gen- uinely other. This paper explores whether a Husserlian account of empathy as the way in which we constitute an intersubjective world can account for the uniqueness and otherness of other people in our experience. I contend that it can’t. I begin by explicating Husserl’s theory of empathy, paying particular attention to the reduction to a purely egoic sphere and the steps that ostensibly permit a (...) subject to re-inhabit a world of others from out of this sphere. In querying Husserl’s theory, I consider a series of problems, raised by Zhida Luo, concerning the apparent centrality of bod- ily similarity in empathy. I sketch Luo’s solution, which involves a shift to tactile similarity. While it makes for a better theory of empathy, this solution isn’t sufficient to make room for the givenness of another person not originally predicated on simi- larity. To clarify what’s at issue here, I turn to the Husserlian pictures of empathy presented by Heinz Kohut and Edith Stein. I conclude with a remark about what might be required, given the inability of Husserlian empathy to make room for the experience of others as singular and other, for a picture of our phenomenal life to have a shape that accounts for the coexistence of empathy to others who are like oneself and hospitality to others as genuine others. (shrink)

This book is concerned with the continuing viability of both Freud and Hegel to the reading of modern literature. The book begins with Julia Kristeva’s attempts to relate Hegelian thought to a psychoanalytically informed conception of semiotics that was first explored in her influential study, The Revolution of Poetic Language, and then modified in later books that develop semiotics in new directions. Kristeva’s agreements and disagreement with Hegel are important to the book’s argument, which ultimately defends Hegel against familiar, poststructuralist (...) detractions. However, the book’s conceptual argument requires a historical exposition, with chapters devoted to literary figures ranging from Spenser to Ishiguro. One of the purposes of the book is to demonstrate that Hegel’s contribution to modern thought is at least partially exhibited in the history of literature, which also corroborates some of the deeper insights of psychoanalysis. (shrink)

A Touch of Doubt traces the theme of touch in the evolution of skepticism through Platonism, German idealism, Continental philosophy and psychoanalysis. Haptic Scepticism, the field of ethics emerging from this study, explores the grasp-ability of contradiction. Contradiction is a haptic marvel. We can cup it in our palms, press it against our lips, dip our toes into its coolness, and, if we are not careful, we may even burn ourselves on its surface.

Antithetical desires displayed throughout Kierkegaard’s authorship indicate the disjunctive assumption that the individual exists either in a state of increasing autonomy, expressed negatively as striving for freedom from divine constraint, or in a state of self-annihilating submission, expressed positively in terms of kenotic unification. Proximity to the divine thereby entails forfeiture of individuality, contrary to the explicit aim of Kierkegaard’s authorial project, and aversion to materiality. This essay enunciates the conflict (I), traces the crescendo of loss that births the pseudonymous (...) authorship and ends in realized longing for death (II), and approaches a more holistic vision of psycho-spiritual development (III). (shrink)

The critical theory tradition has, since its inception, sought to distinguish its perspective on society from more purely descriptive or normative approaches by maintaining that persons have a deep-seated interest in the free development of their personality—an interest that can only be realized in and through the rational organization of society, but which is systematically stymied by existing society. Yet it has struggled to specify this emancipatory interest in a way that avoids being either excessively utopian or overly accommodating to (...) existing society. Despite the fact that Hegel’s concept of reconciliation is normally thought to run aground on the latter horn of this dilemma, this book argues that reconciliation is the best available conceptualization of this emancipatory interest. It presents Hegel’s idea of freedom as something actualized in individuals’ lives through their becoming reconciled to how society shapes their roles, prospects, and sense of self; it presents reconciliation as being less a matter of philosophical cognition, and more of inclusion in a responsive, transparent political process. It then introduces the concept of reification, which—through its development in Marx and Lukács, through Horkheimer and Adorno—substantiates an increasingly cogent critique of reconciliation as something unachievable within the framework of modern society. Giving equal attention to psychoanalysis and legal theory, the second half critically appraises the writings of Rawls, Honneth, and Habermas as efforts to spell out what a concept of reconciliation more democratic and inclusive than Hegel, yet sensitive to the reifying effects of legal systems, might mean. (shrink)

Many commentators have claimed that Nietzsche views the “sublimation” (Sublimierung) of drives as a positive achievement. Against this tradition, I argue that, on the dominant if not universal Nietzschean use of Sublimierung and its cognates, sublimation is just a broad psychological analogue of the traditional (al)chemical process: the “vaporization” of drives into a finer or lighter state, figuratively if not literally. This can yield ennobling elevation, or purity in a positive sense—the intensified “sublimate” of an unrefined original sample. But it (...) can also yield drives that are attenuated or otherworldly, in a pejorative sense. One (but only one) kind of Nietzschean sublimation is the “translation” of drives to “imaginative and spiritual” (Imaginative und Seelische) modes of expression. I con­clude that, despite certain appearances to the contrary, Nietzsche ultimately values basic drives’ powerful expression, without preferring either that this occur specifically as “higher culture” or as “savage” natural impulse. (shrink)

This paper explores Jean Starobinski's often tacit conception of the implied author, with a view to clarifying his intellectual legacy for literary criticism. It argues that it is plausible to trace a certain strand in the intellectual genealogy of Starobinski's literary theory from the descriptive psychology of Wilhelm Dilthey to twentieth-century psychoanalysis and phenomenology. Accordingly, the question "Who is Jean Starobinski?" is formulated in a sense which seeks to move beyond the bare facticity of biographical detail, a sense that can (...) be expected to differentiate between scholarly and purely journalistic enquiry to ask: who, exactly, is the Jean Starobinski that we encounter in his major works - works like "The Living Eye" and "Transparency and Obstruction"? It is from this vantage point that the discussion proceeds to clarify Starobinski's ambivalent relations to both Rousseau and Freud, and thereby to illuminate some of the tensions and nuances inherent in his notion of the implied author. (shrink)

The 'traditional philosophical prestige' of seeing and touching, as analyzed by Emmanuel Levinas, comes to dominate the qualities of the other three senses. An investigation of the roles of these prestigious senses, along with the resultant privileged sense-organs of the hand and the eye, within phenomenology, psychoanalysis, and gender- or queer-theory suggests that the part of the prestige of touch will have been related to its function in the phenomenality of feeling. Yet the sense of taste seems to be as (...) applicable, if not more so, to the phenomenal experience of selfhood based on feeling as theorized by Edmund Husserl and Jean-Luc Marion. The tongue, rather than the hand, is reconsidered as a sense-organ of touch in order to salvage the all but lost tang of the tangible. As such, the tongue and taste not only illuminate the shortcomings of binary gender theories based on either inner feeling or outer surface anatomy (or, either interior orifices or exterior appendages), but further discover a remarkable phenomenology of the body to be found in the writings of Hélène Cixous and Monique Wittig that moves beyond certain masculine tendencies lurking about the hand and observation (as described by Freud and Butler). The phenomenal experience of the other that yields either empathy (for Husserl), love/eros (for Marion), or hearing and heeding 'Thou shall not kill' (for Levinas) has much to learn from the orality of women's writing. The third body, as written by Cixous, can experience the self as selftaste (as considered by Derrida) and experiences the other as the taste of the other. It is, thereby, opened to a love or a justice (or an erotic justice) beyond the proclamation of Levinas that 'ethics is an optics' as well as any ethics as a mere haptics to be found in Husserl or Marion, where feeling seems always determined by the hand. (shrink)

Researchers often talk about a powerful heuristic potential of the Kantian heritage, but sometimes they do not show concrete examples in defense of this opinion outside Kantianism and Neo- Kantianism. This article contains an attempt to demonstrate that on the example of how efficiently C.G. Jung used Kant’s ideas to construct the theoretical basis of analytical psychology in general and his conception of archetypes in particular, we can see the urgency of Kant’s heritage not only for his direct spiritual successors. (...) In addition the question is discussed: why did Jung claim that epistemologically he took his stand on Kant? (shrink)

From Augustine’s (death) drive towards an imaginary time before speech to Marx’s drive toward an imaginary time after speech as we know it, we learn that we are always already within the bonds of the mother tongue. In the late twentieth-century, Derrida turns to both Augustine and Marx to repeat the fantasy of escaping the mother (tongue). Derrida responds to Marx’s analysis of our repeated failure to forget the mother tongue by turning to Augustine’s analysis of the mother’s touch: we (...) cannot forget the mother tongue because it is licked upon our skin. Drawing on Derrida’s relationship to Augustine and Marx on the topic of touch and language, I argue that although the bond of the mother tongue is inescapable, its very real grip upon our skin is founded upon a number of fantasies: the fantasy of the Mother, of a cut with the Mother by the Mother, which separates us from an original shared skin and binds us to the Mother tongue, the fantasy of self-articulation in the death of the Mother. I suggest that the symptoms of the fantasmatic foundation of our entrapment by the mother tongue-touch is expressed in barely perceptible glitches—a shiver passing over one’s skin, a stutter in one’s speech. (shrink)

This chapter combines the insights of Sigmund Freud and Theodor W. Adorno to explain some of the psychoanalytic mechanisms that contributed to a scenario where people voted for a leader who undermines their very existence. Trump successfully exploited the feelings of failure of the millions of Americans who have not lived up to the liberal capitalist ideology of success. By replacing their ego ideal with their leader, Trump voters could get rid of the frustration generated by such an ideology. The (...) people “fell in love” with Trump because he gave them the illusion that they “can become great again.” Moreover, by lifting moral restrictions to being openly classist, racist, and sexist, Trump generated a permanent festival where the American people can feel better than classed, raced, and gendered Others and thus satisfied with themselves again. (shrink)

This chapter shows that taboos erected around crimes inhibit individuals and nations' work of mourning for the victims of crimes. The work of mourning is the precondition that individuals and nations take responsibility for past crimes, show solidarity with the victims and their descendants, and make sure that such crimes are not repeated. I bring Theodor W. Adorno and Sigmund Freud in conversation to explain the connection between taboos and the failure to mourn. I further detail this connection with Antigone (...) as an example of taboo and denied mourning. I also explain that the taboos erected around the National Socialist genocide on Roma and Sinti ("gypsies") do not allow Austrians to mourn the loss of this population. As a result, their taking responsibility for this crime remains stifled, and they fail to show solidarity with the Roma and Sinti genocide victims. (shrink)

Freud’s psychoanalysis of Little Hans is a defining moment in psychoanalytic theory, because it marks the first psychoanalytic attempt ever to analyze childhood as an actuality rather than a set of recollected experiences. This article aims to explain Deleuze and Guattari’s dismissal of Freud’s interpretation as an act of silencing the children that is meant to corroborate his own theories of psychosexual development and particularly the Oedipus complex. Deleuze and Guattari are not against psychoanalytic interpretation in and of itself as (...) a creative intervention into the lived actuality of the analysand, but they think that Freudian psychoanalysis misses the opportunity by tracing every aspect of individual existence back to familial figures and relationships. While Freud considers the case of Little Hans as a verification of his theory of sexuality, Deleuze and Guattari regard the case as a perfect example of how psychoanalytic suggestion often distorts the utterances of the analysand for its own interests, thereby failing altogether to grasp the logic of becoming as an escape from familial determinations. (shrink)

This out-of-print, two-volume, photocopy packet, in the area of "Surrealism and the Politics of the Particular" includes readings on language, meaning, and surrealism from Adorno, Benjamin, McCumber, Breton, Heidegger, Freud, Kristeva, Ricouer, and Bataille.

Adrian Johnston is well known for his work at the intersection of Lacanian psychoanalysis, German idealism, contemporary French philosophy and most recently cognitive neuroscience. In the context of the current issue, Johnston represents the most complete development of a contemporary theory of Transcendental Materialism. In the following interview we explore both the implications of Johnston’s previous work, as well as the directions his most recent projects are taking.

Acknowledging the power of the id-drives, Freud held on to the authority of reason as the ego’s best tool to control instinctual desire. He thereby placed analytic reason at the foundation of his own ambivalent social theory, which, on the one hand, held utopian promise based upon psychoanalytic insight, and, on the other hand, despaired of reason’s capacity to control the self-destructive elements of the psyche. Moving beyond the recourse of sublimation, post-Freudians attacked reason’s hegemony in quelling disruptive psycho-dynamics and, (...) focusing upon the social domain, they sought strategies to counter the oppressive social restrictions and conformist impositions impeding individual freedom that result from thwarted desire. Postmodern celebration of desire at the expense of reason and sublimation leaves the Enlightenment prospects altogether and moves psychoanalysis into a new terrain, where the very notion of rationality and an autonomous ego upon which much of Freudianism rests has been deconstructed. Thus the debate that begins with Freud’s social theories reflects the deeper divisions, which arose with postmodern ethics and discarded Cartesian–Kantian notions of personal identity. Here we consider the moral framework in which Freudian social theory sits and a contrasting understanding of agency that confronts his modernist conception. In that debate, we discern the larger humanist confrontation with postmodernity. Yet, all who engaged Freud shared some version of his utopian ethos, albeit radically restructuring the theory upon which social reform might occur. (shrink)

In this paper, I investigate Freud’s study of infantile zoophobias. According to Freud, in nearly all cases of infantile animal phobias, the feared animal functions as a father figure. The feared animal takes on the prohibitive role as the father substitute. The substitutability of the animal and the father is crucial for Freud, as it anchors his theory regarding the familial, social, and religious structure of a patriarchal society. In light of this standard animal-father substitution, Freud’s biography of Leonardo da (...) Vinci stands out as a provocative exception. In this psychoanalytic biography, Freud examines da Vinci’s relationship with a vulture—only here the vulture is an androgynous creature that serves as a mother substitute. More significantly, unlike other accounts of infantile zoophobia, the vulture has an empowering rather than crippling effect on the infant da Vinci. With the story of the androgynous vulture, I argue that Freud’s interpretation of da Vinci opens up a new way to understand our relationships with animals—a way that not even Freud himself anticipated. In short, I analyze the significance of this deviant case of animal obsession in Freud’s corpus and its ramifications for reconceiving the human-animal relationship. (shrink)

In this book, I develop the novel concept of embodied reflective judgment, which outlines the interconnection between feeling and thinking in judgment. I explain that defense mechanisms to repress feelings of guilt can effectively shut down critical judgment. Finally, I analyze post-war trial cases of Austrian Nazi perpetrators and contemporary debates about Austria’s involvement in Nazi crimes to expose the mechanisms used by individuals and nations to fend off individual and political guilt. Only by confronting guilt can individuals and nations (...) take responsibility for past crimes, show solidarity with the victims of crimes and their descendants, and ensure that such crimes are not repeated. I also develop two concepts to break the cycle of negative consequences resulting from repressed guilt about a nation’s violent past: Embodied reflective spaces, which allow us to reflect on our guilt feelings, and subjects-in-outline, which means that we abstain from wholly identifying with a nation to counter defensive mechanisms when confronting guilt. I ground my analysis in critical theory (Arendt and Adorno) and psychoanalytic theory. (shrink)

If we are to understand why psychoanalysis extends ordinary psychology in the precise ways that it does, we must take account of the existence of, and the interplay between, two distinct kinds of explanatory concern: functional and idiographic. The form and content of psychoanalytic explanation and its unusual methodology can, at least in part, be viewed as emerging out of Freud's attempt to reconcile these two types of explanatory concern. We must also acknowledge the role of the background theoretical context (...) that shapes Freud's functional thinking about the mind. A neglect of the role of the background theory in shaping the extension of ordinary psychology leaves us with puzzles about the nature and direction of the psychoanalytic extension and gives rise to an unbelievable history of psychoanalysis. (shrink)

If we are to understand why psychoanalysis extends ordinary psychology in the precise ways that it does, we must take account of the existence of, and the interplay between, two distinct kinds of explanatory concern: functional and idiographic. The form and content of psychoanalytic explanation and its unusual methodology can, at least in part, be viewed as emerging out of Freud's attempt to reconcile these two types of explanatory concern. We must also acknowledge the role of the background theoretical context (...) that shapes Freud's functional thinking about the mind. A neglect of the role of the background theory in shaping the extension of ordinary psychology leaves us with puzzles about the nature and direction of the psychoanalytic extension and gives rise to an unbelievable history of psychoanalysis. (shrink)

Literature is recognised as having significantly influenced the development of modern psychoanalytic thought. In recent years psychoanalysis has drawn increasingly on the literary and artistic traditions of western culture and moved away from its original medical–scientific context. Originally published in 1991 _The Chamber of Maiden Thought _ is an original and revealing exploration of the seminal role of literature in forming the modern psychoanalytic model of the mind. The crux of the 'post-Kleinian' psychoanalytic view of personality development lies in the (...) internal relations between the self and the mind's 'objects'. Meg Harris Williams and Margot Waddell show that these relations have their origins in the drama of identifications which we can see played out metaphorically and figuratively in literature, which presents the self-creative process in aesthetic terms. They argue that psychoanalysis is a true child of literature rather than merely the interpreter or explainer of literature, illustrating this with some examples from clinical experience, but drawing above all on close scrutiny of the dynamic mental processes presented in the work of Shakespeare, Milton, the Romantic poets, Emily Bronte and George Eliot. _The Chamber of Maiden Thought_ will encourage psychoanalytic workers to respond to the influence of literature in exploring symbolic mental processes. By bringing psychoanalysis into creative conjunction with the arts, it enables practitioners to tap a cultural potential whose insights into the human mind are of immense value. (shrink)

Literature is recognised as having significantly influenced the development of modern psychoanalytic thought. In recent years psychoanalysis has drawn increasingly on the literary and artistic traditions of western culture and moved away from its original medical–scientific context. Originally published in 1991 _The Chamber of Maiden Thought _ is an original and revealing exploration of the seminal role of literature in forming the modern psychoanalytic model of the mind. The crux of the 'post-Kleinian' psychoanalytic view of personality development lies in the (...) internal relations between the self and the mind's 'objects'. Meg Harris Williams and Margot Waddell show that these relations have their origins in the drama of identifications which we can see played out metaphorically and figuratively in literature, which presents the self-creative process in aesthetic terms. They argue that psychoanalysis is a true child of literature rather than merely the interpreter or explainer of literature, illustrating this with some examples from clinical experience, but drawing above all on close scrutiny of the dynamic mental processes presented in the work of Shakespeare, Milton, the Romantic poets, Emily Bronte and George Eliot. _The Chamber of Maiden Thought_ will encourage psychoanalytic workers to respond to the influence of literature in exploring symbolic mental processes. By bringing psychoanalysis into creative conjunction with the arts, it enables practitioners to tap a cultural potential whose insights into the human mind are of immense value. (shrink)

When Carl Jung and Carl Kerenyi got together to collaborate on this book, their aim was to elevate the study of mythology to a science. Kerenyi wrote on two of the most ubiquitous myths, the Divine Child and The Maiden, supporting the core 'stories' with both an introduction and a conclusion. Jung then provided a psychological analysis of both myths. He defined myth as a story about heroes interacting with the gods. Having long studied dreams and the subconscious, Jung identified (...) certain dream patterns common to everyone. These 'archetypes' have developed through the centuries, and enable modern people to react to situations in much the same way as our ancestors. From nuclear annihilation to AIDS and Ebola, we continue to engage the gods in battle. _Science of Mythology_ provides an account of the meaning and the purpose of mythic themes that is linked to modern life: the heroic battles between good and evil of yore are still played out, reflected in contemporary fears. (shrink)

In his latest work, Force-Pulsion-Désir, Rudolf Bernet seeks to clarify one of the fundamental concepts of psychoanalysis, that of “drive.” He engages such authorsas Aristotle, Leibniz, Schopenhauer, Freud, Husserl, Nietzsche and Lacan to better elucidate philosophically the sense of the concept of drive. The work’s argument thushighlights a kind of destiny of drive: the first moment concerns the dynamic aspect of the drive, that of force; the second is that of drive taken in its essence and truth;the third is that (...) of desire which prolongs and sublimates the drive. The path followed in this book thus goes from the non-human to the human or, if one prefers, fromnature to subject, and interrogates their interpenetration. In contrast to naturalism and historicism, Rudolf Bernet chooses to read Freud in a resolutely philosophical way, in a way that at the same time challenges our perception of the relation between philosophy and psychoanalysis. The epistemic stakes are high. Without claiming to address every implication, we briefly retrace here the overall trajectory. (shrink)

Nous envisagerons dans cet article la possibilité d'un abord pratique de la relation entre linguistique et psychanalyse : la modélisation linguistique des données mises au jour par la psychanalyse à partir de corpus tirés du discours courant. La validation de tels modèles d'après les critères requis par l'« approche logiciste » de J.-C. Gardin et J. Molino sera examinée sur un exemple précis que nous exposerons en détail : l'Analyse des Logiques Subjectives, modèle développé, publié et enseigné par nous depuis (...) près de vingt ans. (shrink)

(English then french abstract) -/- This article, which can be read by non-psychoanalysts, intends to browse in four stages through the issue offered to our thinking : two (odd-numbered) stages analyzing the argument that provides its context, and two (even-numbered) of propositions presenting our views on what could be the content of the analytic discourse in the coming years. After this introduction, a first reading will point by point but informally review the argument of J.-P. Journet by showing that each (...) of its clauses may generate a “bifurcated” comment able to serve or go against the analytic discourse. Hence the interest of the “differential diagnosis” mentioned in our title, which makes glimpse the traps that the homonymy may set to this speech. Then, to prepare a second scan which sticks neither to the analytical doxa, nor to the even authoritative opinions of our tenors and seniors, it will be proposed two attempts at redefinitions (“apophatic” and “recursive”) of what psychoanalysis is, as well as methodological tools operating downstream from these redefinitions to thwart the obstacles of “external” and “internal” homonymy (starting from a syllogism which can make consensus).The third stage will precisely be made of our second scan of the issue, whose elements will be reviewed and analyzed more methodically :“external differential diagnosis” between the analytic discourse and psychology, philosophy, sociology, and modern science, and “internal differential diagnosis” on the entanglement between theoretical advances of psychoanalysts and the repeated survival of fantasmatic elements...Finally, a fourth part will present propositions and perspectives resulting from these analysis (principle of economy as to the source of psychoanalytical theorizations; dialogue with the other fields, but without compromising; specific relations with the discourse of science), all this leading to an invitation, beyond disputes, to renew the content of the analytic discourse on some points... -/- --------------------------------------------------------------------- -/- Cet article, qui se veut lisible aux non-analystes, se propose de parcourir en quatre temps la problématique offerte à notre réflexion : deux temps (de rang impair) d'analyse de l'argument qui en fournit le contexte, et deux (de rang pair) de propositions présentant nos vues sur ce que pourrait être la teneur du discours analytique dans les prochaines années. Après cette introduction, un premier parcours réexaminera point par point mais informellement l'argument de J.-P. Journet en montrant que chacune de ses propositions peut donner lieu à un commentaire “bifide” à même de servir ou de desservir le discours analytique. D'où l'intérêt du “diagnostic différentiel” évoqué dans notre titre, qui fait entrevoir les pièges que l'homonymie peut tendre à ce discours.Puis, pour préparer un second balayage qui ne s'en tienne ni à la doxa analytique, ni aux opinions même autorisées de nos ténors et seniors, il sera proposé deux tentatives de redéfinitions (“apophatique” et “récursive”) de ce qu'est l'analyse, ainsi que des outils méthodologiques fonctionnant en aval de ces redéfinitions pour déjouer les embûches de l'homonymie “externe” et “interne” (à partir d'un syllogisme pouvant faire consensus). Le troisième temps sera fait justement de ce second balayage de la problématique, dont les éléments seront reconsidérés et analysés plus méthodiquement : “diagnostic différentiel externe” entre le discours analytique et les discours psychologique, philosophique, sociologique et celui de la science moderne ; et “diagnostic différentiel interne” portant sur l'intrication entre avancées théoriques des analystes et survivance à répétition d'éléments fantasmatiques...Enfin une quatrième partie exposera propositions et perspectives résultant de ces analyses (principe d'économie quant à la source des théorisations analytiques ; dialogue avec les autres champs, mais sans compromissions ; relations spécifiques avec le discours de la science), l'ensemble débouchant sur une invitation, au delà des différends, à renouveler sur certains points la teneur du discours analytique... (shrink)

(English, then french abstract) : -/- Fantasy, Discourse, Ideology – Transmission Beyond Propaganda. -/- Propaganda is everywhere, not only in commercials or politics. It is aimed at faraway strangers as well as nearby friends and relations. Propaganda in fact relies on a certain type of psychic structure, one that is tuned to receive it and disseminate it. This structure is a result of an unconscious subjective identification which is therefore not open to change through either cognition, argumentation or reasoning. Propaganda’s (...) form and content are best explained by an unconscious subjectivity rather than by Pavlov’s theory. The social dimension of this subjectivity may be defined by what we refer to as our ‘Analysis of Subjective Logics’ (a legacy of Lacan’s theory of the Four Discourses, which is deficient in some respects). We will first explore the various facets of the ‘Fantasy to Propagate’ by means of a word by word analysis, and will then go on to describe the connexions between Fantasy, Discourse and Ideology. We will show how a clever manipulator triggers an echo in the psyche of his victims, knitting together different and sometimes even contradictory fantasies in an unsteady synthesis he manages to maintain through patient repetition. As for psychoanalysis, it is not only possible but also highly desirable to practise it in the absence of all propaganda : among analysts, on condition that the precept of authority be outwitted, and within each analysis, by undoing the analysand’s sensitivity to suggestion. Psychoanalysis indeed does not only address the individual’s symptoms and their unravelling, but also, more ambitiously, aims to heal civilization of its discontents. This would entitle us to speak in terms of a genuine form of ‘propaganda prevention.’ -/- ---------------------- -/- Fantasme, Discours, Idéologie - D’une transmission qui ne serait pas propagande -/- La propagande se rencontre partout, pas seulement en publicité ou en politique. Avant d’être verticale et adressée aux lointains inconnus, elle est horizontale et s’adresse aux connaissances proches. C’est qu’elle repose en fait sur une structure psychique apte à la recevoir et à la répercuter, structure qui résulte de l’identification subjective, inconsciente donc non modifiable par la cognition, l’argumentation, la raison. Plutôt que par Pavlov, la forme et le contenu de la propagande s’expliquent par la subjectivité inconsciente. Celle-ci se laisse décrire dans le champ social par notre « Analyse des Logiques Subjectives » (héritière critique de la théorie des Quatre Discours de Lacan, insuffisante à maints égards). Nous passerons de l’analyse des facettes du « fantasme de propager » (par le détail des expressions qui en constituent les réalisations) à la description des rapports entre Fantasme, Discours et Idéologie : comment les habiles suscitent un écho dans le psychisme de leurs victimes en fédérant des fantasmes divers –voire opposés– dans une synthèse instable, mais que sa patiente répétition a pour effet de maintenir. En psychanalyse, transmettre sans propagande est non seulement possible mais souhaitable : horizontalement chez les analystes, à condition d’y déjouer l’argument d’autorité, et verticalement dans chaque analyse, en défaisant chez l’analysant les réseaux de suggestibilité. Car la psychanalyse, loin de se borner à la simple disparition des symptômes individuels, a pour vocation plus ambitieuse de contribuer à déconstruire le « malaise dans la civilisation ». On serait alors en droit de parler d’un authentique « prévention de la propagande ». (shrink)

Na prvi pogled se psihoanaliza in fenomenologija precej razlikujeta, kolikor zadnja nima nikakršnega koncepta nezavednega, četudi je v svojem opisovanju zavesti analogno strukturirana. Pri tem področje transcendentalne zavesti v fenomenološkem opisovanju korelira s področjem nezavednega, že zato, ker sta obe področji predmet »radikalnega« gibanja razsvetljenstva. Področje uporabe se sicer razlikuje, faktično pa, če se ozremo nazaj, sta služili obe vsakič drugemu cilju: s strukturalizmom vstopa psihoanaliza v neko novo paradigmo konstrukcije racionalnosti, fenomenološka metoda pa je v eksistencialni analizi postala individualni (...) instrument analize.At a first glance, psychoanalysis and phenomenology seem to differ largely, insofar as the latter possesses no concept of the unconscious, although it is analogously structured in its description of the unconscious. The sphere transcendental consciousness in phenomenological description correlates to the sphere of the unconscious primarily because both spheres are those of a “radical” movement of the Enlightenment. The fields of application do indeed differ ; factically, however, and retrospectively, they serve two different purposes: with structuralism, psychoanalysis enters a new paradigm of the construction of reality, whereas the phenomenological method with its existential analysis became an individual instrument of analysis. (shrink)

Available from UMI in association with The British Library. ;The first chapter considers the early twentieth century theories of meaning of Frege, Russell, Husserl and Wittgenstein. It argues that Frege's philosophy, particularly in the distinction between Sinn and Bedeutung is flawed by contradiction, and that the greater sophistication afforded by Husserl's phenomenology accounts for various categories of meaning which other theories must condemn as "nonsense." ;Chapter 2 discusses Husserl's distinction between "expression" and "indication" . It considers the discrepancy between his (...) contention that meaning is essentially expressive, in that it is capable of functioning in the absence of an object, and his belief that meaning requires indicativity as a guarantee of such an expressive function. This leads to a discussion of the semantic function of the work "I," which is shown to coincide with its meaning, rather than be, as Husserl thought, a product of that meaning. ;This special status in meaning which the word "I" has is taken up in Chapter 3 from a psychoanalytic perspective. It is shown that the contradiction which "devastated" Frege is positively endorsed by Lacan as a description of the structure of the subject which "I" reveals. Lacan's topologies are considered, concluding that there is irreducible undecidability between his notions of "reality" and "the real." ;The fourth chapter examines the concept of negation in Frege's later philosophy, and argues that Jespersen's linguistics accounts for nuances of meaning which logic must exclude. It is argued that Freudian negation is open to a charge of reductiveness, and that Lacan, whilst overcoming this in situating truth in what he calls "the Other" , does so by promoting a specifically analytic conception of truth. ;In conclusion it is suggested that analytic philosophy and psychoanalysis depend upon an implicit faith in truth-in-language: that language itself is always true, even if what it says is false. (shrink)

This work demonstrates and develops the systematic coherence of Jean-Paul Sartre's theory of existential psychoanalysis as formulated in Being and Nothingness and in his existential psychoanalytic study, Saint Genet. ;A major problem in Being and Nothingness, which obscures the coherence of the theory of existential psychoanalysis, is Sartre's "Cartesian Legacy." His view of Consciousness as separate from the body and nature, and his view of the Self as existing in isolation from other persons, obscures his vision of man as a (...) unified totality. This work attempts to reestablish Sartre's vision of man's being-in-the-world as a unity of consciousness and the body, of Being and Action, of Self and Other, expressed as a fundamental project of working through issues in one's primary relationships with other persons. ;The work proceeds to clarify Sartre's unique conceptual framework for an existential psychoanalysis, addressing such issues as the interpersonal basis of the Self, the meaning of the individual's fundamental project, and the interpersonal dynamics of good and bad faith. Sartre's conceptual framework is related to Freudian theory, especially on the issues of repression and the unconscious, and to contemporary psychoanalytic interpretations of the Self and the issue of narcissism. These psychoanalytic views are integrated within an existential perspective, including references to Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Hegel and Husserl. ;This work emphasizes the therapeutic implications of Sartre's work. I explore Sartre's therapeutic metaphor of "recovering the child within us" as a project of the recovery of Being, and examine such issues as the integration of consciousness and the body, and the importance of empathy, intuition, and play in the therapeutic relationship. ;Clinical examples from my therapy practice at the Human Effectiveness Institute, of Chicago, are included to illustrate Sartrean themes and issues. (shrink)

This dissertation employs a thematic hermeneutic method to critique and revise psychoanalytic theory on countertransference. Psychoanalytic theory is criticized for its reliance on subject/object epistemology. The subject/object assumption is initially found in the early orthodox views that were committed to the idea of the neutral analyst, and then located in the supposed second tier of countertransference theory that described its constructive possibilities. The subject/object assumption is also detected within contemporary psychoanalytic intersubjectivity theory, which has been a partially successful attempt to (...) resolve the epistemological dilemma. Intersubjectivity theory's incomplete resolution rests against a philosophical backdrop composed of the works of Sartre, Husserl, and Heidegger. In this context, it is suggested that intersubjectivity theory has been successful in resolving only one-half of the Cartesian dilemma, but neglects the inherent mind/body split by failing to elucidate the nature of embodiment. Thus, implicitly at least, intersubjectivity theory perpetuates subject/object epistemology. ;A proposed resolution is drawn out of Merleau-Ponty's latter phenomenological work on the notion of flesh. Merleau-Ponty refers to perceptually extended flesh as composed of partially visible and partially invisible dimensions. Flesh is constituted by an intertwining of sensory modalities with the elements of the perceptual field. An elucidation of psychoanalytic epistemology and ontology free of the subject/object assumption is undertaken while drawing on the notion of flesh. Yet limitations are found in the use of the notion of flesh, for it does not contain the activity of human motility and thus does not fully capture the embodied phenomenological experience of analytic encounter. ;Romanyshyn's work on the gestural field is discussed in terms of adding motility to Merleau-Ponty's flesh. But limitations are addressed in that the notion of gesture neither fully amplifies, nor fully animates, flesh. ;The final hermeneutic turn is toward pantomime, which inhabits flesh in the fullest, most animate, sense. It contains not only the motility of gesture but also the dialectical elements of persona and character. The work on pantomime, then, in conjunction with reverie, clears the ground for a fuller resolution of subject/object dichotomy within countertransference theory. (shrink)