How Bion’s Work on Thinking Might Throw Light on the Development of Sexuality

ABSTRACT

In preparing this article, I found I needed to take a step back from the specific topic of castration anxiety to a more general consideration of our contemporary understanding of sexuality. Being from a psychoanalytic tradition (Kleinian/Bionian) that has not foregrounded the place of sexuality, but has produced a deepening understanding of the epistemological instinct, I have explored whether one might draw on the work on thinking to contribute to a more general theory of development, and then track this through to its implications for sexuality.

Notes

¹ At the outbreak of WW1 Bion was 16. In 1917 when he enlisted, he was 19. He served in the 5th Tank Regiment in France, first as a tank commander and then captain – tanks were a new weapon. For his action at the Battle of Cambrai (Nov/Dec 1917) Bion was nominated for the Victoria Cross and earned both the Distinguished Service Order and the French Légion d’Honneur.

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Notes on contributors

Nicola Abel-Hirsch

Nicola Abel-Hirsch is a training and supervising analyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society and works in private practice. She was the 2013–2015 visiting professor at the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex. Her work on Bion includes: on suffering; Freud and Bion on the life instinct; narcissism and socialism; on observation; Bion’s containing and Winnicott’s holding; and currently, on the place of sexuality in Bion’s work. She is the editor of Hanna Segal’s book Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.