Critique and Cure: A Dream of Uniting Psychoanalysis and Philosophy

Critical theory, whose aim was to historicize philosophy through integrating it with the social sciences, turned to psychoanalysis to find its way through an accounting of philosophy after the Second World War. Over 50 years after this initial project, the rift between philosophy and psychoanalysis has never been greater. If Jacques Lacan could be considered one of the few psychoanalysts to maintain and foster links to philosophical thought in the latter half of the 20th century, his work has sadly remained marginal in the clinical field throughout America and Europe. Both critical theory and Lacan remain skeptical of the direction taken by psychoanalysis after Freud. Reflecting on the history of these two disciplines, as well as through an examination of Theodor Adorno's posthumously published dream journal, critique and cure emerge as two dialectically intertwined themes that gain momentum in the dream of the unification of the philosophical and psychoanalytic projects.