Racism and Psychoanalysis: How They Affect One Another

Abstract

The relationship of psychoanalysis and issues of race has been complex. In this article, I will discuss three main issues: (1) What can psychoanalysis teach us about the psychology of racism; (2) How does racism affect psychoanalysis today; and (3) How can racism in psychoanalytic institutes be lessened or ameliorated?

Keywords:

• race
• psychoanalysis
• Nazi
• prejudice
• Sullivan
• psychopathology

Notes

1 Neiman (2019) writes: “The question of whether Jews should count as White people was not quite settled in the South where I was born. ‘There’s an old saying,’ Reverend Wheeler Parker, who was Emmett Till’s cousin, told me. ‘If I was Catholic and I lived in the South, I’d be worried. If I was Jewish, I’d be packing up. If I was black, I’d be gone.’”

2 Freisler was only partially correct, in that American immigration practice at the time identified Jews as a race. In 1938, my grandfather, Max Blechner, emigrated to the United States from Germany. His immigration form, issued at Ellis Island, states: Nationality: German. Skin: White. Race: Hebrew. In subsequent years, there were intensive debates in the U.S. government about the relationship of race, ethnicity, country of origin, and native language (Perlmann, 2018). Today (2020), the U.S. immigration form continues to ask about race, but the possibilities are White, Asian, Black or African American, American Indian or Native Alaskan, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander. There is a separate yes-no question: “Are you Latino?” There is no category for Jews, but “White” is a person “having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa.”

3 In Maryland in 1957, the law read: “All marriages between a white person and a Negro, or between a white person and a person of Negro descent, to the third generation, inclusive, or between a white person and a member of the Malay race or between a Negro and a member of the Malay race, or between a person of Negro descent, to the third generation, inclusive, and a member of the Malay race, are forever prohibited, and shall be void; and any person violating the provisions of this Section shall be deemed guilty of an infamous crime, and be punished by imprisonment in the penitentiary for not less than eighteen months nor more than ten years” (Maryland Code Ann., Crimes and Punishments, art. 27, §§ 393, 398 (1957)).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mark J. Blechner

Mark J. Blechner, Ph.D., is Training and Supervising Analyst at the William Alanson White Institute, and adjunct Professor and Supervisor at New York University. He has published four books: The Mindbrain and Dreams: Explorations of Dreaming, Thinking, and Artistic Creation (2018), Sex Changes: Transformations in Society and Psychoanalysis (2009), The Dream Frontier (2001), and Hope and Mortality: Psychodynamic Approaches to AIDS and HIV (1997). He established scholarships to fund the training of candidates of color and transgender candidates at the White Institute. He practices psychoanalysis and psychotherapy in New York City, where he also leads private dream groups.