Interpretation and Contemporary Reinterpretation

Abstract

In basic psychoanalytic theory of technique, interpretation and insight reveal the latent content beneath the manifest appearance of symptoms, character pathology, and disturbed irrational behavior. The understanding of the neutrality and objectivity of the analyst, however, has been modified with new formulations of interpersonal, intersubjective influence and dyadic unconscious communication. Transference is often regarded as coconstructed in the present in a transference-countertransference field, emphasizing the analytic relationship and experience as a two-person analytic process. Nevertheless, the analyst is capable of good enough objectivity and neutrality for analytic work. Countertransference interpretation expands insight into the patient, as well as the analyst. Interpretation is not only resisted, but is reinterpreted by the analytic dyad with gradual partial insight and integration. The infantile unconscious, genetic interpretation, and reconstruction are often devalued in some object relations frameworks. A clinical vignette illustrates the continued importance of the past in the present without neglect of current determinants and perspectives. While integrating newer considerations of the two-person analytic field, interpretation and insight into the dynamic unconscious are here regarded as the sine qua non of psychoanalysis.

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Harold P. Blum

Harold P. Blum, M.D., is Executive Director of the Sigmund Freud Archives; Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Training Analyst, Institute of Psychoanalytic Education of the New York University School of Medicine; Vice-President, IPA; and Past Editor in Chief, Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association.