From Whose Point of View? The Neglected Question in Analytic Listening

Abstract

The central question which I hope to address is: how do we discover, in our clinical work, what we had not before even considered, another way of thinking about a matter? Drawing upon clinical examples, including a critique of my material, I shall illustrate a mode of listening which attempts to keep clear the delineation of whose point of view one is referring to—patient's or analyst's. In so doing, I shall consider some conceptual, methodological, and epistemological ramifications of this effort in an attempt to demonstrate the potential for deepened illumination of nuances of the patient's experience—and of our own—which may otherwise go unnoted.