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In response to Dr. Tronick's article on the evolution of responses to trauma, I explore the advantages of extending his study by differentiating between three types of trauma. I suggest that as analysts recognize chronic trauma that derives from pervasive racial and cultural prejudice, critical domains of social relevance open up for psychoanalytic consideration on levels of theory and practice. On a clinical level we are enabled to address suffering associated with social marginalization and neglect otherwise thought to be outside the realm of psychoanalytic applicability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article I suggest that there is a confluence of perspectives between Gandhian nonviolence and the Kleinian depressive position. Whereas nonviolence refuses the kind of polarization between and among people that enables violence, the depressive position posits an underlying commonality between and among people that can be ruptured by defensive disavowal and dissociation. This confluence points to an underlying parallel between healing approaches, East and West. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we discuss processes of self-development in the contemporary context of rapid cultural change and social/vocational mobility. People must make and remake themselves continuously as technology evolves; education must be life-long to prepare people for the fading of long-term jobs and the emergence of short-term consultancies. Traditional and stable cultural forms and mores rapidly give way to flexible practices in relationships and in work life. We focus on social media, particularly Snapchat, to illustrate how identities have come to be formed only for the immediate present in a visual medium. Claude Lanzmann's refusal to include archival footage of the Jewish Holocaust in his film Shoah is a precedent for a timeless approach to history that recognizes the past only by its reflection in the present. We compare this notion to the psychoanalytic idea of transference, in which the personal past is understood to exist, to all intents and purposes, only in the present moment of the analytic relationship. This way of thinking allows us to orient ourselves to a cultural world in which the history of the self is sedimented into its immediately present manifestation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This fine collection of articles documents efforts to bring Anna Freud’s diagnostic profile (1965) up to date by integrating more recent theory and research in attachment theory, inter-subjective theory, and theories deriving from the work of Bion on the process of “containing” (Bion, 1988). While some of the articles present the theoretical context for this integrative effort, Melandri’s (this issue) thoughtful and comprehensive clinical case shows us how an updated diagnostic profile can be put to work in the consulting room. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Yvette Esprey’s claim that race has the capacity to disrupt thinking in the analytic situation accords with my own experience. In this discussion I take up the question as to why ruptures that occur around race may have a special capacity to disrupt and disable analytic thinking. I look in detail at Esprey’s instructive clinical experience as it gives us a template, something to fall back on, in those moments when anxiety overwhelms us around a racial disruption. Such a template can settle us until we can restore a sense of self that is bothracedand analytically focused on the rupture at hand with all its personal and social/historical resonances. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article considers the evolution of Bion's theoretical ideas in the context of unthinkable experiences to which he was subject in World War I. The article considers how war trauma encoded in Bion's theory contributes to the unique way his theory speaks to people in the contemporary world. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper, a collaborative effort, describes the work of A Home Within (AHW), a volunteer community-based organization providing pro-bono long term psychotherapy to current and former foster youth. We provide a brief description of the treatment model, present a report of treatment conducted by an AHW volunteer, and discuss further reflections on the societal context of our psychoanalytically-informed work. In-depth psychotherapeutic process from the treatment of a young girl in a pre-adoptive foster placement elucidates the psychotherapeutic possibilities when a psychoanalytic treatment model is accessible to current and former foster youth, usually deprived of this form of treatment due to overburdened, underfunded community mental health systems in the U.S. Open-ended psychotherapy afforded this traumatized child an unusual opportunity to work through past relational traumas in order to form new and more secure attachment relationships. We reflect further on the case from the vantage points of both the psychotherapeutic process and the greater societal context of this community-based program. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The case of Colette is discussed with 'reading' considered as a metaphor for the process of thinking about the traumatic experiences to which Colette has been subject. From this perspective, there is a parallel between her work with Dr. Ganzer and her struggles around attending her program's reading class. Consideration is given to issues around termination in public sector clinical work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article suggests that psychoanalysis can take place both in the private office and out of the office in community-based settings. It provides historical background about the way in which psychoanalysis came to be thought of largely as an office-based practice for an affluent, culturally specific clientele. The article describes efforts at training candidates and students in the use of spontaneously occurring interactions in community-based settings in a range of cultural and socio-economic contexts, in order to illuminate unconscious interpersonal and intra-psychic dynamics. It suggests that the mentalization fostered by psychoanalytic processing of these interactions can provide an important protective element to an expanded range of people against the inter-generational transmission of trauma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I consider some of the issues raised by the way the American Psychological Association has dealt with the participation of psychologists in interrogations at Guantanamo Bay. I set forth some of my experience, and what I feel I learned, from trying to convince the Council of Representatives of the American Psychological Association to support a moratorium on the participation of psychologists in interrogations of detainees at centers where due process is systematically denied. The paper was written before the Council of Representatives voted down the idea of a moratorium, with a coda describing the outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper consists of the online discussion of Nancy Hollander's ‘Psyche, Ideology, and the Creation of the Political Subject’, summarized. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I aim to bring a psychoanalytic perspective to bear on suicide bombing. I argue that our response to suicide bombing, along with horror and condemnation, should include regarding the act as, among other things, a potential communication. I try to look at all sides of the question of whether we should try to understand suicide bombing and suicide bombers. Addressing this question will bring up issues of humanization and dehumanization, how vicious circles of dehumanization develop, and the psychological perils of humanizing, in our minds, suicide bombers. Next, I take up questions of humiliation, to which I believe suicide bombing is a response, with respect to both the oppressed and the oppressors. I will take up the question of what might be communicated by suicide bombing and, finally, I address some of the implications of the line of thinking I develop in this paper. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, I consider some of the dilemmas and challenges of a male therapist working with female adolescents, in counterpoint to those facing the father of adolescent daughters. There is a conventional wisdom that female adolescents need female therapists; I argue that this kind of thinking is related to the common phenomenon of fathers withdrawing emotionally from their daughters when they reach adolescence. I draw out some implications of what it might mean to father an adolescent daughter if one does not accept the conventional wisdom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper consists of a discussion of Neil Altman's ‘Psychoanalysis and war’, which was conducted online through PsyBC in the fall of 2006. Discussants were a group of psychoanalytically oriented thinkers chosen by the author and Nancy Hollander, the author of the other paper included in the discussion. The paper represents the full discussion with only minor edits to correct typographical errors and improve clarity. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this commentary, I argue that if humor is to be considered in an intersubjective context, the impact of any comment or action by analyst or patient cannot be predicted with much confidence. An interaction that is experienced by both parties as humorous depends on an unconscious confluence that is largely spontaneous. Efforts to orchestrate a particular outcome to an intervention that is meant to be humorous may well reveal more than was intended, and thus have an unpredictable unconscious resonance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I consider the psychoanalytic significance of taking account of the historical context, across generations, in which the emotional lives of analysands take shape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this response to Rustin, Goldman, and Schwartz, I note the ways in which their commentaries have stimulated my thinking further. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I argue that on both the small-scale level of the interpersonal relationship, and the large-scale level of society, the manic defense makes it difficult to care about others, and so militates against a sense of social responsibility. I address four basic questions: what is the nature of social responsibility? What is the nature of the manic defense? How does the manic defense interfere with the potential for social responsibility? And, on a more general level, what are the issues with respect to methodology for efforts such as this one to link psychoanalysis and social theory? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dynamics of the larger society inevitably are manifest in intrapsychic dynamics, as well as interpersonal interactions, in and out of the psychoanalytic consulting room. Traditional psychoanalytic inattention to the social world predisposes analysts to enact unreflectively some of the racist and classist patterns in the social world around us in our clinical work. This author argues first that U.S. psychoanalysis, as a field, has sought to define itself as white, thereby demonstrating the influence of racism in this country. Second, in a clinical example, the author demonstrates the subtle imprint of racism and classism in a dyad in which both participants are conventionally classified as white. He concludes that open discussion of U.S. history and of the past and current social location of psychoanalysis as a field goes hand in hand with increased awareness of the ways in which social forces organize psychoanalytic interactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this discussion of papers by Gillian Straker and Melanie Suchet, the author draws some links between the two papers in the interest of expanding analysts' understanding of the nature of whiteness as part of a racist discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I outline some of the ways in which I believe the psychoanalytic traditions in North America and in Great Britain are influencing each other. I identify points of convergence and divergence at this moment in the evolution of psychoanalytic theory and technique. I then point out some of the implications of relational perspectives in child psychotherapy as this perspective is developing in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this appreciative discussion of Shabad's paper, the author suggests an expanded role for intrapsychic conflict around the passionate drive to grow and change. At the same time, he suggests that the parent or analyst may need to 'suffer passion' him or herself in order to help the patient or child evolve in this way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops a contrast between Buddhist and psychoanalytic perspectives on war. I discuss dissociative mechanisms that allow people, soldiers and civilians, to avoid coming to terms emotionally with the horror of war. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the panel that follows, Hoffman's dialectical and constructivist perspective is brought to bear on the polarity between self-interest and concern for others evident in the contributions of Layton and Slavin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides information on the developments in the journal "Psychoanalytic Dialogues." This development widened the membership of the International Association for Relational Psychoanalysis. Promotions from different positions are also presented in this article including Anthony Bass as the new executive editor, and Steven Cooper and Stephen Seligman as full editors in chief.

Analyzes the trauma that was caused by the terrorist attacks in New York in September 11, 2001. Factors contributing to the onset of trauma; Psychological effects of living with long-term terrorism; Focus on the transference-countertransference implications of a patient and an analysts buffered by the same traumatic events; Implications for psychoanalytic practice.