The Whiteness Taboo: Interrogating Whiteness in Psychoanalysis

ABSTRACT

Whiteness, a sociopolitical racialized hierarchy, has been normalized, codified, and internalized by psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic spaces, including psychoanalytic institutes. In order for psychoanalysis and its practitioners to situate ourselves in society as relevant and useful, and mitigate racism and racist enactments, collusions with whiteness must be interrogated. Interrogating whiteness is an iterative process which presents an urgent need in the field of psychoanalysis. Linking theory with personal accounts, the author introduces a whiteness interrogation process. As a candidate in a psychoanalytic training institute, the author also describes how candidates and members can interrogate whiteness in psychoanalytic spaces, including theory, praxis, and institutions, while simultaneously engaging in personal whiteness disruption work.

Acknowledgments

I offer deep gratitude to Dr. Lara Sheehi and Dr. Stephen Hartman for your valuable support, dedication, and editorial suggestions. This paper would never have made it here without you.

Notes

¹ The title of this paper emerged collaboratively with Janie Riley and Ben Ringler.

² https://native-land.ca/maps/territories/pueblos/ (see NativeLand.ca - Pueblos. [2020]).

³ See the Homestead Act of 1862.

⁴ By “white spaces” I mean “white-centered spaces”, implying that whiteness is unquestioned and assumed as normative (Layton, 2006) by many of the constituents who make up these spaces— and by the field of psychoanalysis. This does not refer to the personal identifications of the constituents in these spaces.

⁵ What would it be like if white-identified people could consider that the “other” is us?

⁶ As far as I know.

⁷ As of this writing, my institute has had no Black graduates.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Molly Merson

Molly Merson, L.M.F.T., is a white, gender non-binary psychoanalytic psychotherapist with a practice in Berkeley, CA (Ohlone), and a fourth-year analytic candidate at Psychoanalytic Institute of Northern California (PINC). Molly has spoken on podcasts and written articles, papers, and blog posts on a variety of topics including psychoanalysis and the social. Molly co-founded the Interrogating Whiteness in Psychoanalysis project and is on several committees at PINC, and is a Board Member-at-Large on SPPP’s Section 9, Psychoanalysis for Social Responsibility.