More Than Simply Human: Intersectionality in Psychoanalytic Theory, Practice, and Establishment

Abstract

In a society that is increasingly awakening to the intersectionalities of identity and self-definition, psychoanalytic work must not remain dissociated from the larger racial, ethnic, class, cultural, sexual, and gender dynamics informing and structuring our psychic realities through layering, overlapping, and decussating entanglements. These intersectionalities are always defined against—and by—power dynamics. Malin Fors’ article (in this issue) outlines some of these power themes that weave in and out of the practitioners’ and patients’ lives, inside as well as outside the office. In this article, I explore the relevance of intersectionality. I move within a psychoanalytic thought frame from the themes outlined by Fors to a different perspective on intersectionality. I propose that the denial of three fundamental intersectionalities lies at the very core of Western, White culture, and therefore, also at the core of psychoanalytic theory, practice, teaching, and establishment. These intersectionalities are: Mind/Body, Individual/Community, and Human/Nature. This denial, I suggest, is what originates, facilitates, nurtures, and reinforces the neglect of racial, ethnic, class, cultural, sexual, and gender intersectionalities in the service of maintaining established power structures.

Keywords:

• intersectionality
• body
• community
• nature
• race
• culture

Acknowledgments

To my work with B.W., without whom many of these awakenings would not have happened.

Notes

1 For a detailed discussion of Sullivan’s sexuality, and his contribution to ideas about it (see Blechner, 2005).

2 By power structures I imply many levels: ideas that make up theories; gate keeping of journal publications; systems of training and supervision; organizational regulations; as well as content of curricula.

3 The IPA adopted “The Boston Declaration on the Role of the International Psychoanalytical Association in Addressing Global Change” in 2015. The declaration was formulated by John Kress, Lindsay Clarkson, Donald Moss, and Lynne Zeavin.

4 Others, defining capitalism differently, may trace its origins to somewhere between the 16th and 18th centuries C.E., and to Adam Smith’s 1776 treatise, “An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of nations.”

5 I did my medical training in post-colonial India within an educational system set up largely by the British and therefore encountered no education in indigenous medical traditions that have existed for thousands of years in the culture.

6 I have presented, not yet published, an alternate model of “integrative individuation” that may be more applicable, at least, to Indian culture. While it is not possible to elaborate fully here, the goal of development in this model is seen as an integration with the social group rather than a separation from the parental one.

7 “Pawan guru, pani pita, mata dharat mahat”—Sloka (verse) at the conclusion of Japji Sahib, composed by Guru Nanak (1604 C.E.).

8 In his Diaries (Amery 1987), Leo Amery, British Secretary of State for India (1941–1945), quoted this statement from Churchill.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Gurmeet S. Kanwal

Gurmeet S. Kanwal, M.D., is a Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. He is Supervising Psychoanalyst and Teaching Faculty at the William Alanson White Institute, and Past President of the William Alanson White Psychoanalytic Society. He is member of the Editorial Board, and Fellow of the College, of the International Journal of Psychoanalysis, and Editorial Board member of the Journal of Psychoanalytic Discourse. He is coeditor, with Dr. Salman Akhtar, of Bereavement- Personal Experiences and Clinical Reflections (Karnac) and Intimacy: Clinical, Cultural, Digital, and Developmental Perspectives (Routledge). He is in full-time Private Practice in NYC.