Homophobia is the patient¹

1. A previous version of this paper was published in the journal Sitegeist, Vol. 1, no. 7 (Karnac Books, 2008).

Abstract

This paper draws on psychoanalytic work with a heterosexual woman who struggles with the conscious and unconscious aspects of her homophobia. It reflects on the limitations of the classical psychoanalytic interpretations of phobia as a symptom in the light of contemporary philosophers such as Levinas, Foucault and Butler. It focuses particularly on the connection between anxiety and the relation to the Other.

Keywords:

• homophobia
• sexuality
• Freud
• Foucault
• Levinas
• Butler

Notes

1. A previous version of this paper was published in the journal Sitegeist, Vol. 1, no. 7 (Karnac Books, 2008).

2. Both are founders of the Site for Contemporary Psychoanalysis.

3. Those details of her life which might identify Teresa have been disguised in order to protect the confidential nature of the work.

4. See, for example, Lacan's claim that ‘It is in the name of the father that we must recognize the support of the symbolic function which, from the dawn of history, has identified his person with the function of the law’ (Lacan, 1966, p. 67).