Clinical Outbursts and Theoretical Breakthroughs: A Unifying Theme in the Work of Stephen A. Mitchell

  • The psychoanalytic exploration of the analyst's erotic counter-transference has remained a subject rarely addressed in open colle-gial dialogue. This paper addresses this professional reticence as a manifestation of two interwoven resistences. The first, an avoidance of the physiologically based substrata of self and object organization growing out of certain preconceptions derived from a structural-drive model. And the second, an unwillingness to view the parent/analyst as a full participant in the child's romantic oedi-pal struggles. An alternative formulation based on a reconfigured, relational model of mental structures is suggested. Here the physical experience of self in relationship to a host of significant internalized others becomes a meaningful organizing component for both the patient and the analyst, one that must be incorporated into the ongoing exploration of transference – countertransference manifestations. Likewise, the unfolding oedipal situation between parent and child, patient and analyst, is viewed from the perspective of a two-person model within which the shared symbolic participation of both becomes a necessary prerequisite for the kind of resolution that lays the groundwork for mature love. A clinical example in which the analyst felt it necessary to disclose the presence of erotic countertransference is explored from several perspectives.

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Metadaten
Author:Jody Messier Davies
Parent Title (English):Psychoanalytic Dialogues Vol. 04 (1994), pp. 153-170.
Document Type:Articles
Language:English
Year of first Publication:1994
Release Date:2017/11/20
Format:xerox upon request / Fotokopie auf Anfrage
IdNo:Davies_J_M_1994
Erich Fromm's Library and Erich Fromm Archive:Articles / Artikel
Licence (German):
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