Psychoanalytic Theory and Technique
Bion spent his life as a scholar transposing his theory of groups into his theory of individual psychoanalysis, argues Giuseppe Civitarese. In Bion’s model of analytic field theory, the analyst sees in the analytical pair not two isolated subjects that interact, but a group. There is no “fact” of analysis that cannot be heard as unconsciously co-created. Highlighting the group inspiration of the late Bion helps us to grasp the meaning of this technical principle, so easily misunderstood, and vice versa.
Arguing in favour of Strachey’s translation of Freud’s nachträglichkeit as “deferred action,” Steven Groarke presents clinical observations on a patient’s emerging sense of the past; the paper discusses the continued importance of “deferred action” and the implications of “backwards causation.” Engaging with Winnicott’s theory of object-use to consider the problem of memory, Groarke introduces the concept of “reclamation” as a type of re-descriptive memory.
Richard Zimmer looks at aspects of the termination of psychoanalysis that are connected to the dissolution of symbiotic ties with the analyst. Relinquishment of the frame can provide an impetus for consolidation and reworking of an identification with the analyst, which may enable the patient to develop a personal way of thinking about the unconscious that differs from that of the analyst. Termination may provide an opportunity for self-analytic work beyond what could have been attained within the formal analytic setting.
Child and Adolescent Psychoanalysis
Infants can express emotional distress through gaze avoidance which can be very subtle, says Bjorn Salomonsson. Gaze avoidance elicits important theoretical questions: what does the child seem to avoid in the adult’s eyes, and how can we conceptualise the psychodynamics behind the symptom? Technical questions are also raised: how can the therapist make contact with an infant who avoids the eyes? How can the countertransference help the analyst understand the dyad’s emotional communication?
Archival Section
The Jewish psychoanalyst Edith Jacobson is known for her participation in a leftist resistance group and long prison sentence in Berlin for “high treason.” Judith A Kessler has discovered Jacobson’s notes from prison – the “black booklet,” dated 1935–1935 – containing poems and essay fragments on the effects of imprisonment on female prisoners and psychoanalytic ideas about paranoia. Kessler’s paper sheds light on this discovered text.
Clinical Communications
Elise Pelladeau explores defensive modes of masochism, arguing that moral masochism can be seen from the perspective of melancholic processes. Drawing on a clinical case, Pelladeau shows how in the melancholic process, the primitive idealisation of the introjected and denigrated object can be understood as form of moral masochism, where unconscious idealisation defends against depressive breakdown.
IPA Panel Reports
A selection of reports on panels from the IPA Congress Vancouver 2021 (online).
Obituary
Dana Birksted-Breen, Heribert Blass, and Jacqueline Amati-Mehler reflect on the life of Argentinian born Prof Jorge Canestri – former President of the EPF and longstanding IJP Regional Editor for Europe. They describe him as a prolific writer and polyglot, highly knowledgeable about many areas of the arts and sciences; he was a real Renaissance man.