Contemporary Theorists
Descriptions, metaphors, ideas about how to introduce these theories to students.
Introduce Topics
Recommended Resources
Course Assignments
INTRODUCE TOPIC
I teach Lucie Cantin, Julia Kristeva, and Franz Fanon.
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A teach a little about Michell and relational, but with many caveats. I describe patients who can't seem to form an attachment, who seem to need some revelations by the therapist. I caution that this can lead to boundary violations, which reassures most students.
I also use Irwin Marcus's theories of countertransference, Buie's theories of empathy, etc.
Jerome S. Blackman, M.D.
Adjunct Professor of Psychology
Virginia Wesleyan College
Jsbmd1@cox.net
jblackmanmd@aol.com
RECOMMENDED RESOURCES
Mitchell. S. A. & Black, M. J. (1995). Freud and Beyond: A History of Modern Psychoanalytic Thought. New York: Basic Books.
Monte. C. F. & Sollod, R. N. (2003). Beneath the Mask: An Introduction to Theories of Personality. New York: Wiley.
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COURSE ASSIGNMENTS
Our Inner Conflicts
as Teaching Material
I am a teacher of writing at
a relatively large research institution in the US. I teach mostly
first and second year students, and I have tried for years to import
psychoanalytic readings into my writing courses.
I have also written a book,
Self-Development and College Writing, that draws upon self-psychology
(Kohut) and object relations (largely Winnicott) for its theoretical
foundations.
My students do not enter my
writing classes wishing or hoping to know anything about psychoanalysis.
Indeed, if they have heard even of Freud, they have heard primarily
that he was a coke-head. In fact, this seems to be all that is
taught about Freud in our so-called psychology department that is devoted
almost entirely to rat-psyche.
I have had though success in
introducing students to psychoanalysis in some very basic ways by using
portions of Karen Horney’s Our Inner Conflicts. This
book is very clearly written; examples abound. Her three basic
personality types are interesting and recognizable in daily life
I ask my students to decide
which of the three types they think they are and then to write a paper
showing me their understanding of that type and why they think they
below to it. Students, of course, object; they say there are certainly
more than three types of people. They are right. But I believe
also that in this rejection of types students express a degree of narcissistic
wounding at being labeled at all. One is not unique or special if one
belongs to a category.
In response I suggest that
the point is not the label or what label one belongs to but to use that
label as an analytic category, as a way, however provisional or temporarily,
of organizing one’s experience so that one might articulate it (in
an organized paper).
Overall students respond well
to this assignment. Finally, they have a bit of fun with it, and
some students show in their writing an understanding of the neurotic
process as described by Horney. I think the assignment does in
small ways go towards my goal. I want to suggest to students that
psychoanalysis is not just a theory, but a theory that might prove useful
to their understanding of their own lives.
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