Search

Underpinned by rigorous close readings of his oeuvre, this book provides a comprehensive guide to the development, practice and evolution of Wilfred Bion’s clinical psychoanalytic work. Starting with the significance of Kant during Bion’s years as a student, the author traces the key influences on Bion in his psychoanalytic and personal development, progressing through Bion’s particularly productive pre-psychoanalytic work based on social field theory, his well-known elaboration of Klein’s schizoid mechanisms known as the theory of containment, all the while with his deeply thoughtful clinical approach inspired latterly by an understanding of literary creativity. Extending this unique emphasis on Bion’s clinical work, rather than his theory, Hinshelwood also explores how Bion’s early traumatic experiences helped shape his attitudes and approach to effective clinical work. With comprehensive coverage of the key tenets of Bion’s work, this should be essential reading for psychoanalysts and psychotherapists in practice and in training who seek a clear guide to the practical applications of his theory.

The social sciences and psychology see the origins of human experience from opposite directions: the inner world of the individual vs demands by society to conform. Politicians tend to follow the ideas of the social scientists and mostly ignore unconscious factors. Psychoanalysts, on the other hand, tend to focus on the human unconscious and mostly ignore the complexities of society, economics, and history. Yet, both disciplines are rooted in humanity. Social forces impact on individuals; and society is but the creation of individuals themselves. Thus, factors from both sources have validity and must impact on each other. Hinshelwood has turned to psychoanalysis as the subjective science, to balance the attempted objectivity of social sciences. The creation of a psychosocial model to bring the sparring disciplines together has been attempted many times on a conceptual level but Hinshelwood starts with a singularly interesting convergence at the level of observation. At a time where we face the imminent collapse of human civilisation, and possible extinction of the human species, it is important we attempt to understand the processes that have led us here. We need to find out where the forces of society and the imperatives of our individual selves converge in these particular threats. In order to regenerate some real optimism for our future, we need psychoanalysis to investigate the unconscious dynamics in where we went wrong. A predominant theme identified by Hinshelwood is the gradual, long-term dehumanisation of humans, which has led to widespread alienation from both society and the self. This takes place alongside the convergence of the value of money with the value of a person. Hinshelwood's use of the psychoanalytic theory of the unconscious mind to investigate humanity, society, and capitalism brings fresh insight to the intractable fractures we see in our social systems worldwide and hope for change.

Psychoanalysis is, above all, the science of the emotions but, as yet, there is no single accepted theory of affects. Instead, there are many, all of them too limited, based, as they are, on idiosyncratic introspection. R. D. Hinshelwood presents an extensive scoping of the prominent theories from the philosophy of mind and academic psychology alongside a review of psychoanalytic ideas based on instinct theory or object relations. This wide review of divergent theories from various disciplines helps to mitigate variation and identify commonalities. From this scoping exercise, Hinshelwood creates a form of qualitative meta-analysis which enables the most common dimensions to come to the fore - namely, 113 features of affects form a more general theory with four dimensions. This more systematic view offers an affective 'space' as a model for thinking about the nature of affects, their origins, and their consequences. At the same time, Hinshelwood retains the personal. He starts with the memory which initiated his quest to understand how much we are rooted in the experience of our feelings and includes a chapter documenting his own idiosyncrasies to bring his own bias to the fore. In this way, the book preserves the especially personal and intimate quality of its universal topic.

When madness is intolerable for sufferers, how do professional carers remain sane? Psychiatric institutions have always been places of fear and awe. Madness impacts on family, friends and relatives, but also those who provide a caring environment, whether in large institutions of the past, or community care in the present. This book explores the effects of the psychotic patient's suffering on carers and the culture of psychiatric services. Suffering Insanity is arranged as three essays. The first concerns staff stress in psychiatric services, exploring how the impact of madness demands a personal resilience as well as careful professional support, which may not be forthcoming. The second essay attempts a systematic review of the nature of psychosis and the intolerable psychotic experience, which the patient attempts to evade, and which the carer must confront in the course of daily work. The third essay returns to the impact of psychosis on the psychiatric services, which frequently configure in ways which can have serious and harmful effects on the provision of care. In particular, service may succumb to an unfortunate schismatic process resulting in sterile conflict, and to an assertively scientific culture, which leads to an unwitting depersonalisation of patients. Suffering Insanity makes a powerful argument for considering care in the psychiatric services as a whole system that includes staff as well as patients; all need attention and understanding in order to deliver care in as humane a way as possible. All those working in the psychiatric services, both in large and small agencies and institutions, will appreciate that closer examination of the actual psychology and interrelations of staff, as well as patients, is essential and urgent.

Although the concept of the Unconscious was common in the 19th century, Freud attempted to put research onto a systematic footing from the 1890s, using a clinical method. However, Freud's scientific achievements have been subsequently questioned. Many attempts to research into the unconscious mind have been tried, and a critical survey of the extra-clinical methods is needed. The book is stimulated by this real need, and aims to be a collection of approaches by those investigating unconscious processes in social sciences, experimental psychology, and organisational studies. The collection outlines a wide range of psychoanalytic research methods and illustrates them with engaging examples.The general aim of the book is to address:a. the use of psychoanalysis as a theory for generating hypotheses;b. methods employed for collecting data appropriate for inferring unconscious contents and process; andc. psychoanalytic methods appropriate for analysing such data.Our choice of book chapters allows for linking the different applications of psychoanalysis to explore the methodological issues regarding inferences about unconscious processes. Whilst we do not expect to provide a 'how-to' manual, we aim to help think about the more basic questions of matching research projects to specific methodologies.

This book is a relevant and timely contribution to the current debate about both the nature and validity of psychoanalysis and its body of knowledge.

This book focuses on the professional ethics of medicine and psychiatry, to know whether psychoanalysis differs from brainwashing. It addresses a divergence—a choice between repression and splitting, and examines how the findings concerning a divided mind relate to philosophical issues.

The Clinical Paradigms of Melanie Klein and Donald Winnicott seeks to introduce the distinctive psychoanalytic basic principles of both Klein and Winnicott, to compare and contrast the way in which their concepts evolved, and to show how their different approaches contribute to distinctive psychoanalytic paradigms. The aim is twofold – to introduce and to prompt research. The book consists of five main parts each with two chapters, one each by Abram and Hinshelwood that describes the views of Klein and of Winnicott on 5 chosen issues: Basic principles Early psychic development The role of the external object The psychoanalytic concept of psychic pain Conclusions on divergences and convergences Each of the 5 parts will conclude with a dialogue between the authors on the topic of the chapter. The Clinical Paradigms of Melanie Klein and Donald Winnicott will appeal to who are being introduced to psychoanalytic ideas and especially to both these two schools of British Object Relations.

The 1920s was the decade when psychoanalysis moved from the fringes of accepted medical practice into the mainstream. It also witnessed the birth of the English-language International Journal of Psychoanalysis. Freud continued to dominate the psychoanalytic arena with his continuing innovations and expansion of ideas but topics of interest outside of his inspiration also grew. The influx of women into the profession led to new discussions on female sexuality and, possibly, to greater interest in psychoanalysing children. The papers in this volume deal with substantial issues in the development of psychoanalysis that still have profound echoes in psychoanalytic discussion today. Beautifully edited, with the papers divided into their subject matter and contextualised through comprehensive and clear introductions, this is an essential anthology of classic papers with contributions from Karl Abraham, Sandor Ferenczi, Anna Freud, Edward Glover, Karen Horney, Ernest Jones, Melanie Klein, Joan Rivière, and Hermine von Hug-Helmuth.

In this book, the case histories of Melanie Klein and her followers are scrutinised, to examine both what the clinicians were noticing in their patients, and how they conceptualized those processes.