Psychoanalysis On and Off the Couch
Health & Fitness:Mental Health
"The ability to play means we can indulge in a kind of illusion, not delusion, and make a distinction. It always amazes me that when the patient arrives, they like the routine of an analysis; nobody breaks that, it's an illusion; it is a piece of theater every time. We open the door to our patients and they lie on the couch, and yet there is something enormously gratifying as the patient works out their sense of reality from that illusory field. I think it is exactly what the mother is able to bring to the infant - this capacity to play and this capacity to continue to evolve beyond the analysis as an internalization of that experience of being listened to and being with someone. The details of that is related to an intrapsychic surviving and non- surviving object in the analyst who continues to think and feel and be with the patient in the consulting room.”
Episode Description: Joel begins his conversation with Jan around Winnicott's conceptualization of aggression in development and in the analytic encounter. She noted that he had a very sophisticated developmental theory of aggression which culminated with the role that the destruction of the object plays in constituting reality. Jan explains that she has elaborated Winnicott’s late theory of aggression with her notion of the ‘surviving object'. She distinguishes the 'surviving object' from the 'good object', especially as it stands apart from a moralizing position. She considers its internalization as an essential condition for healthy development. They discussed the role that insight continued to play for Winnicott after he emphasized the importance of the patient’s experience in the analytic process. They also consider the ‘fear of woman’ as a root of misogyny. After discussing the uniqueness of the analytic setting to facilitate play, fantasy, and “magic which is not psychosis,” Jan concludes by emphasizing the importance of in-person treatment in order to have an in vivo experience of the non-retaliatory analyst.
Linked Episode:
Episode 144: Why Winnicott? Joel Whitebook, PhD
Our Interviewer and Guest:
Joel Whitebook, PhD is a philosopher and psychoanalyst. He is on the Faculty of the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research and was the founding Director of the University’s Psychoanalytic Studies Program. In addition to many articles on psychoanalysis, philosophy, and critical theory, Dr. Whitebook is also the author of Perversion and Utopia (MIT) and Freud: An Intellectual Biography (Cambridge).
Jan Abram, PhD is a training and supervising analyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society and in private practice in London. She is a Visiting Professor of the Psychoanalysis Unit at University College London and is currently Vice President of the European Psychoanalytic Federation for the Annual Conferences. She is President-Elect for the EPF to start her term in March 2024. She is a Visiting Lecturer and supervisor at the Tavistock Clinic in London. In 2016, she was a Visiting Professor at the University of Kyoto, Japan, where she resided for a writing sabbatical. Jan Abram has published several books and articles notably The Language of Winnicott, Donald Winnicott Today (2013), The Clinical Paradigms of Melanie Klein and Donald Winnicott: Comparisons and Dialogues (co-authored with R.D. Hinshelwood 2018); The Surviving Object: psychoanalytic clinical essays on psychic survival-of-the-object (2022) and her second book with R.D. Hinshelwood: The Clinical Paradigms of Donald Winnicott and Wilfred Bion: Comparisons and Dialogues (2023).
Recommended Readings:
ben
Abram, J. (2022) The Surviving Object: Psychoanalytic Clinical Essays on Psychic survival-of-the-object New Library of Psychoanalysis Routledge
Abram, J. (2023) Holding and Containing: on the specificity of Winnicott's object relations theory Holding und Containing: Zur spezifischen Natur der Objektbeziehungen bei Winnicott. Psyche - Z Psychoanal 77 (9), 768-796 DOI 10.21706/ps-77-9-768
An Analyst's Hindu-Indian Imagination with Sudhir Kakar (Goa, India)
'Does it Still Taste like Psychoanalysis’? - University Affiliation in Finland with Jan Johansson (Helsinki)
The Presence of 'Companioning' in Psychoanalysis with Robert Grossmark, PhD (New York)
The Dynamic Underpinnings of the Eating Disorders with Tom Wooldridge, PsyD (San Francisco)
Female Sexuality in India Today: Through an Analytic Lens with Amrita Narayanan, PsyD (Goa, India)
Infertility and its Unconscious Reverberations with Mali Mann, MD (San Francisco)
The Repair of a Frame Gone Awry with Alan Karbelnig, PhD (Pasadena, California)
An Analyst’s Catholicism with Ginta Remeikis, MD (Rockville, Maryland)
Our Oral Tradition and the Aging Analyst with Nancy McWilliams, PhD (Lambertville, New Jersey)
The Spirit of Music in Psychoanalysis with Peter Goldberg, Ph.D., Michael Levin, Psy.D and Adam Blum, Psy.D (San Francisco Bay Area)
IPA Prejudices, Discrimination and Racism Committee with Abel Fainstein, MD (Buenos Aires)
Acute Psychoanalytic Care of the Victims of the October 7th Massacre with Merav Roth, Ph.D. and Mira Ehrlich-Ginor, Ph.D. (Tel Aviv)
Treatment of Child Soldiers: Traditional Healers and their Dynamic Underpinnings with Martha Bragin, PhD MSW (New York)
Why Winnicott? Joel Whitebook, PhD (New York) interviews Jan Abrams, PhD (London)
From Filmmaking to Psychoanalysis with Karen Dougherty, FIPA (Toronto)
The Presence of Religion within the Psychoanalytic Dyad with Nathan Szajnberg, MD (Palo Alto)
Superego, Conscience and the Narcissism of our Times with Don Carveth, PhD (Toronto)
Are Patients Different Today? with Stefano Bolognini, MD (Bologna)
From Technology to Psychoanalysis with Nicolle Zapien, PhD (Oakland)
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Your Sleep Guru Podcast
Anxiety Slayer™ with Shann and Ananga
Men Do Talk Podcast
The Dr. John Delony Show
On Purpose with Jay Shetty