Reply to Commentaries by Crastnopol,Goldman, and Mitchell

In replying to the commentaries by Margaret Crastnopol (2001), Dodi Goldman (2001), and Stephen A. Mitchell (2001), I address the relationship of modernism to postmodernism, with emphasis on the possible conflicts between therapeutic effectiveness and the postmodern view of experience in general, and core affect in particular, as culturally constructed. I elaborate on the claim I made in “Analyzing Multiplicity” (Fairfield, 2001) that developmental schemas, however central to psychoanalysis at the present time, are vulnerable theoretically. Difficulties in bringing terms such as agency and authenticity into a postmodern paradigm are considered. In discussing some common misunderstandings of the critical approach known as deconstruction, I emphasize its ethical import and its kinship to psychoanalytic theory and practice. Special attention is paid to deconstructing the binary categorization American/not-American and to exploring the distinctively American origins of some current models of subjectivity.     

Psychoanalysis in Postmodern Times: Some Questions and Challenges

As a consequence of the invitation to contribute this piece of writing, I acknowledge having a postmodern attitude, rather than subscribing to postmodernism as an ideology. The purpose behind this article is to reflect on the impact of postmodern times on psychoanalysis from the starting point of my own conception of psychoanalytic theory and practice. This article looks, in some detail, into the problem of truth in psychoanalysis, the issue of theory building in psychoanalysis in its relation to psychoanalytic practice, and the challenges for psychoanalysis as a pluralistic discipline. It repeatedly states that psychoanalysis evidences extreme theoretical and practical diversity, but no pluralism understood as an attitude and methodology of dialogue between theoretical orientations and practical approaches. The current challenge in psychoanalysis is, precisely, to go beyond postmodernism and to build a true pluralism on the basis on interdisciplinary exchange and collaboration.     

On the Importance of Being (Earnestly) Hybrid—Or,Qualms of a Quasi-Postmodernist: Commentary on Paper by Susan Fairfield

Dr. Fairfield makes a strong case that contemporary analytic theorists fail to live up to their apparent aspiration to present a thoroughgoingly postmodern conceptualization of the self. She argues instead in favor of a “hybrid” model—one that includes a dollop of modernism in the postmodernist brew. In this commentary, I critique the theorizing process inherent in psychoanalytic postmodernism, and then comment on and give a clinical example involving the self's “configurality.” I argue that we need to embrace the challenges of postmodernism without so privileging this position that we let it loosen our grasp of the realities of everyday clinical experience that might cause us to question postmodernism's tenets or values. Moreover, we must not assume that we can gauge the full impact of our “model of subjectivity” on the therapeutic process by knowing what we think we think.     

Psychic Truth and the In-Session Work of the Analyst

I seek to address one of the issues most affected by the postmodern culture, such as the crisis of rationality and truth, and try to reformulate its place within the psychoanalytic clinic using the contributions of Freud and Ferenczi, who drew the matrix of a passionate dialogue about the truth and the analyst work that has nurtured many contemporary theoretical developments. Essentially, the major influences of postmodern thought in psychoanalysis are to emphasize the importance of the patient–analyst interaction, the role played by the analyst in the patient’s transference and the rejection of the model of the analyst as a distant observer who interprets without having anything to do with whatever happens within the mind of the patient. Consequently, because both postmodernism and psychoanalysis are concerned with human subjectivity and love for truth, although indeed understanding them from different perspectives, both schools of thought become easily interrelated. I conclude that psychoanalysis, committed as it is with the search for truth, cannot ignore the influence of postmodern thought, as well as the postmodernist movement should not disregard all theoretical consistency provided by psychoanalytic theory and metapsychology.     

The Products of the Imagination: Psychoanalytic Theory and Postmodern Literary Criticism

This article considers some of the affinities between postmodern literary theory and the psychoanalytic theories concerned with intersubjective phenomena. Postmodern literary theory is described briefly, and it is argued that one of its major concerns is the nature of, and the political and cultural influences on, subjectivity and identity. Despite that, postmodernism generally, and literary postmodernism in particular, can be said to lack a theory of the psychological and interpersonal dimensions of the experience of self. This article contends that the more relational schools of psychoanalytic theory can provide an example of the construction of selfhood that is of importance to contemporary and postmodern literary criticism. The academy has, to a considerable extent identified psychoanalysis with the work of Jacques Lacan, but since the 1980s the work of such theorists as Jane Flax and Jessica Benjamin, building on the work of Nancy Chodorow, have increasingly opened up the possibilities of relational and object relations theory for literary studies. The relational psychoanalytic theories operate in the same epistemological universe as postmodern literary criticism, congruent with the postmodern idea of truth as constructed and relational, and selfhood as shifting, contingent, and always-in-process. Particular attention is paid to the work of Wilfred Bion, whose understanding of self provides an account both of the failure of meaning, and of the development of mind. Some examples of a relational approach to literary analysis are provided.     

A confusion of tongues between psychoanalysis and philosophy: Is the controversy over drive versus relational theory a philosophical one?

In recent years the controversy over Drive versus Relational models of the psyche has become entangled in a philosophical controversy over epistemology. Some have argued that the Drive model was a relic of an age of positivistic science, while Relational models are a product of a postmodern condition. This paper argues that the controversy need not be a philosophical one, and that Relational views are not, in fact, a product of postmodernism, nor are they necessarily dependent on a postmodern epistemology. Separating the epistemological from the psychological more carefully may help return the debate to its proper, psychoanalytic domain, and perhaps contribute to a more fruitful dialogue across what, at times, seems like an abyss between Relational views and Drive theory.     

Truth and Consequences: What We Lose and Gain in Psychoanalytic Postmodernism

In this article, I use the psychoanalytic concept of truth as a lens through which to explore how psychoanalysis has changed and not changed under the influence of postmodernism. I suggest that the seeking after truth remains in current psychoanalytic practice even though under different guises or conceptual umbrellas, for instance in the high value placed today on authenticity (or trueness) to self and of relationship. Although, admittedly, the search for truth in the sense of compiling historical facts has receded, our current interest in the construction of narratives still comes with the requirement that the stories we co-create with our patients at least have the ring of truth if they are to facilitate psychic growth and psychological intimacy. Additionally, I offer an overview of some of the salient characteristics of postmodern psychoanalysis, with suggestions as to how each of these might relate to the concept of truth. In closing, I borrow a brief clinical vignette from the unpublished notebooks of Melanie Klein for the purpose of making a brief comparison between earlier and current ways of interacting in the treatment relationship.     

The postmodern counsellor: Some implications for practice,theory, research and professionalism

What is postmodernism? What are the implications of the death of God, science and the subject for counselling? Further questions include: To what extent does postmodernism, show that behavioural, humanistic, existential, and most psychoanalytic theories are delusional in that they would have the clients/patients believe that they are the core, the centre, the subject? What are the dangers of seeing ‘others’ practically, theoretically and when conducting research as either enhancing our narcissism and/or the counselling order? In terms of an ethical practice, can the postmodern counsellor stop counselling from reverting to a technique orientated mechanism of professional vested interests, and instead find a better way for us all to put the other first?     

Analysts' observing-participation with theory

The author summarizes some of the literature's critiques of psychoanalytic theory, which have noted its constrictive quality and failure to take into account the vicissitudes of treatment within each analytic dyad. Such postmodern reactions have given rise to a countertheoretical trend toward psychoanalytic pluralism, leading the author to suggest that a single, standard psychoanalytic technique no longer exists. The interpersonal tradition, which tends to prioritize praxis over theory, is discussed in the light of its emphasis on an intersubjective model of participant-observation, and two clinical vignettes are presented to illustrate the author's way of utilizing this model.     

FORTY YEARS LATER: WHAT HAVE WE ACCOMPLISHED?

Abstract. I examine the responses to John Caiazza's “Athens, Jerusalem, and the Arrival of Techno‐Secularism” as part of Zygon's forty‐year anniversary symposium. The responses reveal that issues of modernism and postmodernism are central to understanding the dynamic of the current science‐religion/theology dialogue and that the resistance of many of the participants to the influences of postmodernism is a sign not of its backwardness but rather of some of the weaknesses inherent in the postmodern project. This does not mean that the many insights of postmodernism should be rejected. Rather, the science‐religion/theology dialogue may be in an intellectually opportune place to construct successors to the worn label of postmodernism.     

Beyond Theory and Practice: A Postmodern Perspective

The insights of chaos theory and postmodernism can be applied by therapists to resolve the apparent conflict between theory and practice. Using the example of the modern scientist, the argument is made that for therapy to have integrity the therapist needs a theoretical foundation. This theoretical orientation, however, is tempered by a postmodern perspective that recognizes the finite nature of all theories. The therapist is encouraged to have a theoretical orientation, but not to become that orientation.     

Out of the consulting room and into the world: hermeneutic dialogue, phronesis, and psychoanalytic theory as practice

One of the relics of positivism has been an underappreciation of the moral and ethical dimensions of psychoanalytic theory and practice. In a positivist metapsychology, cure and therapeutic gain were often defined instrumentally, with relatively little consideration given to aspects of human experience (e.g., moral, cultural, spiritual) that did not fit within a positivist framework. Conceptual and paradigmatic shifts in psychoanalysis have occurred, in part, because of the inability of the classical model to provide a language that adequately captures deeply felt human values and beliefs. Aided by hermeneutic and postmodern influences, many contemporary psychoanalytic theories are beginning to focus greater attention on the notion that analytic therapy is empowered by a set of ethical convictions, beliefs, and commitments, which are tied to a certain understanding of the good life. Along these lines, the author argues that developing a fresh understanding of the moral and ethical dimensions of psychoanalysis requires elaborating a new ontology of human subjectivity and social life. The author offers a sketch of how this gargantuan task might be started by integrating psychoanalysis within a hermeneutic perspective on dialogue, by suggesting that it would be helpful to view psychoanalysis as promoting Aristotelian practical wisdom or phronesis, and by rethinking psychoanalytic theory and interpretation as a form of practice.     

Different Subjects: Postmodern Selves in Psychology and Religion

This paper explores the postmodern suspicion toward the notion of a unified self in light of the scholarship of Michel Foucault and Michel Certeau. Foucault’s analysis critiques modern subjectivity by highlighting the dangers of the human sciences and the pastoral power of Christianity. His ethical alternative of re-appropriating classical concepts of caring for the self is intriguing but remains unfinished after Foucault’s death. Drawing on Foucault’s ideas, Certeau articulated alternative psychoanalytic and Christian mystical perspectives that describe human subjectivity based not on unity, rationality, and universality but on multiplicity, myth, and possibility.     

西方心理学中的现代主义、后现代主义及其超越

当代西方心理学中存在着现代主义取向和后现代主义取向的对立和冲突。冯特以来的西方心理学流派大多属于现代主义的范畴。现代主义的特征是：(1)重视科学的价值,强调科学的方法;(2)信奉经验主义;(3)个体的中心地位。后现代主义取向的核心是社会建构主义,其主要特征为：(1)批判的倾向,对现代心理学的理论基础进行解构;(2)把社会建构论作为认识论的基础;(3)促进心理学实践的四个转变。尽管两种倾向形成鲜明的对照,但两者也存在着一些共同的方面,从而构成了超越两者的基础。两种取向的超越需要以科学实在论作为元理论的基础,并需要双方互补、合作和开放的态度。     

Postmodern Thought and Christian Education

This article examines the impact of postmodern thought on Christian education. It briefly defines postmodern perspectives and their impact on reasoning in a Christian context and examines specific postmodern positions on the notion of truth and its validity or rationality. Education has been impacted by postmodern thought by an opening of thinking about the ways of knowing which include more than empirical or technical ways of knowing. Postmodernism argues that meaning is negotiated rather than being exact and limiting. As popular trends and popular culture bring postmodern thought to everyone, the impact on the thinking of Christian students and educators is examined to encourage discovery of what fits in Christian thought and what does not. The impact of what postmodern thought means and does in higher education is discussed as a challenge for all educators. A comparison in a Christian context, of modern and postmodern positions, examines what is good from modernism and what is not, as well as what is good about postmodernism in order to know what to keep and what to discard. As postmodernism opens the way for acceptance of multiple perspectives, Christian educators are challenged to examine their own systems of thought and to know how best to deliver instruction in a Christian context.     

Subjective education in analytic training: drawing on values from the art academy

Abstract: Kernberg and others have observed that psychoanalytic education has tended to promote the acquisition of theoretical knowledge and clinical technique within an atmosphere of indoctrination rather than of exploration. As a corrective, he proposed four models that correspond to values in psychoanalytic education: the art academy, the technical trade school, the religious seminary and the university. He commended models of the university and art academy to our collective attention because of their combined effectiveness in providing for the objective and subjective education of candidates: the university model for its capacity to provide a critical sense of a wide range of theories in an atmosphere tolerating debate and difference, and the art academy model for its capacity to facilitate the expression of individual creativity. In this paper, I will explore the art academy model for correspondences between artistic and analytic trainings that can enhance the development of the creative subjectivity of psychoanalytic candidates. I will draw additional correspondences between analytic and artistic learning that can enhance psychoanalytic education.     

More Life: Centrality and Marginality in Human Development

At both ends of the century, a border between the aberrant-marginal them and the ideal-central us has been constructed around and through the homosexual. I challenge the insufficiency of this characterization, so that we may learn more, not only about homosexuality, but also about the ways in which all human development is infused with an interplay between centrality and marginality. I argue that traditional developmental models are dominated by the normative logic of centrality, with limited accounting for the developmental necessity of marginality, whereas postmodern theories of subjectivity overvalue the potential of the margin and fail to account for the significance of similarity and coherence in human relations. I then use that criticism as a platform for proposing five quasi-axioms toward a new developmental model. Central to this new model, which employs constructs derived from chaos and systems theories, is the interplay of centrality and marginality in any given life.     

Introduction Voices The Editors

Postmodern theory and critiques currently exert a considerable influence on psychoanalytic theory, particularly in regard to the revision of a theory of sexuality and gender. This article reviews some of the critiques and alternative views of sexuality proposed by various postmodern theorists such as Butler, Jameson, Baudrillard, and Foucault. After conducting a critical comparison of these critiques and alternatives with contemporary analytic revisionist theory, I contend that, despite the useful aspects of postmodernism's critical cultural perspective, some postmodern positions run directly counter to certain key psychoanalytic tenets about human agency and the existence of an inner psychic world or selfhood. Furthermore, I believe that, despite the laudable politics of many postmodern writers to promote a greater diversity of nonpathologized sexual experience, the atrophied views of agency and selfhood depicted in the postmodern writings reviewed in this essay cannot support an approach that is concerned with clinical treatment or with describing processes of psychological transformation. A case vignette is provided illustrating the main arguments of the paper.     

Existentialism and postmodernism. Continuities,breaks, and some consequences for medical theory

Since existentialism lost its influence in philosophy in the 1960s, postmodern theory has taken over criticizing basic concepts of western thought. From a postmodern point of view, the main shortcomings of existentialism is that it criticizes traditional unitarian concepts, while re-inventing new unitarian models. Against these unitarian approaches postmodernism holds that the world can only be described in terms of difference. In this article the postmodern program and its differences from existentialism are explained in reference to three concepts of western philosophy: subject, truth, and ethics. Applying these concepts, the relevance of postmodernism for medical theory is illustrated.