What After Pluralism? Ulysses Still on the Road

Abstract

In this work I intend to convey from an autobiographic perspective what it meant for me to become an analyst in a small Latin American country, in an especially turbulent moment in its history. When I graduated from medical school and began my psychoanalytic training, there were marked contrasts in Uruguay. In the political arena there was a long military dictatorship during which human rights and freedom of expression were not respected, while within the Psychoanalytic Association of Uruguay a cultural ambience of pluralism and freedom of thought rich with European tradition could be felt. The existence of multiple approaches—both theoretical and technical—is a positive thing, depending on the way the differences are dealt with. I will reveal some characteristics of the coexistence of various perspectives in Uruguay and reflect on the conditions that made our pluralistic situation a fostering factor for psychoanalysis.