"Enactment" in the lives and treatment of Holocaust survivors' offspring

This paper explores an aspect of "enactment" often seen in Holocaust survivors' offspring: the compulsion to re-create their parents' experiences in their own lives through concrete acts. At the core of this compulsion is a psychic hole, a gap in the child's emotional understanding, stemming from identification with the parents on one hand, and the parents' denial or repression of the trauma on the other. The compulsion to enact can be transformed into a cognitive mode when such offspring are helped to find the meaning of the trauma in their parents' lives, as is illustrated here by clinical examples.     

The Nazi Heritage and Gender Identity

This paper explores the impact of Nazi ideas and values from education in Napola schools of the National Socialist regime on the development of gender identity during late childhood and adolescence. Difficulties in this realm are illustrated by means of biographical material from a study performed at the Sigmund-Freud Institut in Frankfurt. In this study, interviews were conducted with former Napola students, their children, and grandchildren. A clinical example focuses on the theme of haircutting typical of Napola trainees and the impact this had on the development of a man's gender identity. The examination of two further generations showed that the haircut played an important role in their lives and caused difficulties in the development of masculinity, as well as femininity.     

Anti-semitism and Xenophobia*

This paper explores the link between anti-Semitism and xenophobia from a psychoanalytic prism. The author claims that anti-Semitism is a particular form of xenophobia directed against Jews, with some unique characteristics. She first introduces some basic notions about xenophobia, and then discusses the origins of anti-Semitism as they are viewed in early psychoanalytic thinking and in contemporary psychoanalysis. The article explores the nature of anti-Semitism in society today, and presents some reflections on the interplay between anti-Semitism and other kinds of xenophobia.     

“PLAYING WITH REALITY” IN A NAZI CONCENTRATION CAMP

This paper explores the function of play under traumatic circumstances, focusing on playing with the reality of a Nazi concentration camp. The goal of playing was to enhance life forces, which was achieved by active mastery of the passive trauma, re-establishment of inner equilibrium, transformation of internal reality into a more bearable one, recovery of symbolic functioning. The analysis of the movie “Life is Beautiful” is used for illustrating this theme.

     

Some psychoanalytic reflections: femininity,feminism and fantasy in “APPLE TREE YARD”

This paper examines the interplay between femininity, feminism, and fantasy, based on the analysis of the protagonist of Apple Tree Yard, a British television mini series (2017) adapted by Amanda Coe from the novel of the same name by Louise Doughty (Apple Tree Yard. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 2013). This examination addresses the following questions: What causes a married, 52-year-old woman, with two grown children to engage in a reckless and perverse affair with a man she does not know? What unconscious fantasies have been evoked by the traumas of her childhood and of her adult life, and how do these unconscious fantasies encroach upon her external reality?

     

From psychic holes to psychic representations

Abstract

In this essay, I will explore the term “psychic hole,” and compare it to similar terms from the world of astrophysics and terms used in the psychoanalytic literature. I will then present my own conception of the “psychic hole” in cases of Holocaust survivors' offspring. I will explain how this “hole” is created, and describe a particular aspect of the “psychic hole” that is unique to Holocaust survivors' offspring, namely the enactments (termed “concretization” by Bergman) generated by the negated traumatic themes that reside in it. I will illustrate these enactments using clinical material taken from case studies of Holocaust survivors' offspring that I have previously published. The clinical vignettes reveal the transgenerational impact of the memory hole resulting from negation of survivor parents on the lives of their offspring, up to the third generation. They also show the painful journey from enactments to psychic representations, a journey which exposes the traumatic events that have been denied or repressed, and facilitates the work of mourning and the eventual achievement of a better integrated self. Finally, I will offer technical suggestions for analysts to help patients transform psychic holes into psychic representations.