Projective Identification

This forthcoming (rewritten) paper argues for the significance of swearing as a different type of language (a "proto-language") - one that serves to project and express unbearable, pre-verbal frustration, fear and feelings about Life's struggle, as well as truly awesome beauty. It is pitched somewhere in the psyche as an intermediary between feeling and action, before thinking makes its mark as a modifying agent.

A detailed exploration of the various unconscious meanings of different types of swearing modes is undertaken, and swearing is revealed as a complex and important form of emotional communication, notwithstanding its basis in the "primitive" origins of infantile anxiety.
The paper - originally a conference presentation with audio and video excerpts - is currently being updated (from its pre HBO-Netflix original form) because times have changed significantly in the past decade re Swearing no longer being quite the taboo that it once was.
During "renovations" this draft for the conference presentation is being made available, temporarily, and comments are welcomed - although the audio-visual elements are absent, and some paragraphs are still in shorthand form.

Miranda Fricker has characterized epistemic injustice as “a kind of injustice in which someone is wronged specifically in her capacity as a knower” (2007, Epistemic injustice: Power & the ethics of knowing. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 20). Gaslighting, where one agent seeks to gain control over another by undermining the other’s conception of herself as an independent locus of judgment and deliberation, would thus seem to be a paradigm example. Yet, in the most thorough analysis of gaslighting to date (Abramson, K. 2014. “Turning up the lights on gaslighting.” Philosophical Perspectives 28, Ethics: 1–30), the idea that gaslighting has crucial epistemic dimensions is rather roundly rejected on grounds that gaslighting works by means of a strategy of assertion and manipulation that is not properly understood in epistemic terms. I argue that Abramson’s focus on the gaslighter and on the moral
wrongness of his actions leads her to downplay ways in which gaslighters nevertheless deploy genuinely epistemic strategies, and to devote less attention to the standpoint and reasoning processes of the victim, for whom the experience of gaslighting has substantial and essential epistemic features. Taking these features into account reveals that all gaslighting has epistemic dimensions and helps to clarify what resistance to gaslighting might look like.

The work of W. R. Bion changed the shape of psychoanalytic theory in fundamental ways, one of the most important of which was Bion’s insight into the nature of normal projective identification. No other psychoanalytic theorist has Bion’s ability to represent the horrors of psychic abandonment and the converse, the absolute necessity of the presence of another mind for psychic survival. Through a discussion of Bion’s War Memoirs 1917–1919 (Bion, 1997), Attacks on linking and A theory of thinking (1993), this paper explores the link between war, masculinity, the maternal and Bion’s sensitivity to the significance of everyday interpersonal contact. It is argued that Bion’s apocalyptic experiences as a teenage tank commander gave him shattering insight into the extent to which mind is inter-mind, self is inter-self. Bion’s life writing has the quality of survivor insight: ‘And only I am escaped alone to tell thee’ (Job 1: 14–19), as he returns repeatedly to the events of the day when he ‘died ’, 8 August 1918. His insight into the elemental passions nature of love, hate and mindlessness are borne of his experiences on the battlefield, and exquisitely crystallized in his repeated explorations of an encounter with a dying soldier.

This paper offers a Kleinian view of the relational understandings described in Mills' paper, regarding two central issues: the exploration of the analyst's subjectivity by the patient, and the use of self-disclosure. It is suggested that from a Kleinian perspective it is less advisable to 'invite' the patient to explore the analyst's subjectivity, or to use self-disclosure as a curative procedure, since major analytic work focuses on the primitive parts of the personality, i.e., the working through of deep anxieties, massive projective identification and a deep confusion between self and object. When working with these primitive parts of the personality, the transference relations are suffused with projections, and the patient is therefore unable to clearly address the other's subjectivity. Furthermore, in these areas of object-relations the patient seldom uses symbolic language, but instead suffers from the dominance of symbolic equations, which enforce the delusion of sameness between internal and external objects. Inviting the patient to explore the analyst's subjectivity, or exposing the patient to otherness through self-disclosure thus serve as communications to the more adult, saner parts of the patient's personality, while the more psychotic, confused parts which bring about most of his sufferings remain neglected.

Charles Baudelaire, notable for his work, Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil), is perhaps “...the first truly urban poet, a poet of the built environment” (Del Nevo 509). As one of the pivotal poets of the modernist movement, he sought to break away from the traditions of poetry by seeking beauty in perversity—or seeking beauty perversely (Del Nevo 510). In particular, T.S. Eliot summarizes Baudelaire’s contribution to both literature and possibly humanity:
Baudelaire is indeed the greatest exemplar in modern poetry in any language, for his verse and language is the nearest thing to a complete renovation that we have experienced. But his renovation of an attitude towards life is no less radical and no less important (Rainey 171).

But it is insufficient to settle with the knowledge that Baudelaire was original in obsessively finding beauty in the perverse. In this essay, I provide an overview of Baudelaire as a poet through close readings of selected poems from Les Fleurs du Mal. Through this overview, I attempt to analyze Baudelaire’s poetic mind as an urban explorer (flaneur) using the psychological concepts of projective identification and synesthesia (a poetic technique that he is also well-known for), both of which highlight his unorthodox perception of reality that will serve as a major influence for succeeding poets of the Symbolist tradition.

From the very beginning of our life until its end, we long for the mythical union with the other, which is based on a combination of moments of near-perfect harmony between mother and infant in early infancy and unconscious phantasies concerning an ideal connection and complete satisfaction (Klein, 1963/1997). Simultaneously, there lies a whole set of aggression toward, anxieties of, and defenses against the bad, frustrating object. The struggle and balance between these two attitudes are at the roots of true love. This paper addresses a few main factors that stand in the way of true love and the psychological conditions that might enable love to last: The love for the " otherness " of the other; facing the ethical challenge embedded in sexual lust; and above all and most prominent, the love of truth. A clinical example from Mitchell's book Can Love Last? will be dreamt into an analysis taking place with the author of this paper, illustrating the main ideas presented and the way they are explored in the analyst's mind through projective identification and worked through within the analytic encounter.

This paper is devoted to the ‘logic of the unconscious’ and its application to the analysis of projective intentionality in psychoanalysis. Special attention is given to the logical analysis of the notion of an internal object, and to a logical reconstruction of the phantasy of projective identification.

This forthcoming paper draws attention to some possible unconscious processes that might occur in the transference /counter-transference work with a severely depressed patient - especially when things seem stuck at an impasse, and the patient seems to have withdrawn into painful silences.
Some  material from psychotherapy  with a young women who had been abused intrusively by her father when she was a young child is discussed, with a view to highlighting some hitherto obscure aspects of an infant's psychological use of the Father - particularly in relation to the capacity for experimentation and exploration in imaginative thinking and the enjoyment of a fantasy life, as a prelude to adult sexuality.
Some common counter-transference traps and technical difficulties receive some speculative comments - as do some ideas about the formation of creative, experimental states of mind in adult intimate relationships.
Melanie Klein thought that projective identification could have its positive aspects, when used as a basis for empathy - the (Shakespearean) capacity to imagine oneself into the psyche of an Other.
But, this is only possible for the child in a spirit of play and adventure and safety - beyond the sometimes intrusive thoughts or actions of a disturbed parent, or parent figure.

The objective of this article is to think the task of teaching under the focus of the vicissitudes to which the teacher-student relationship is subjected, which steer pupils and teachers away from the ideals of order and harmony. With the purpose of analyzing the intersubjective flows in the classroom, aspects of group psychodynamics are investigated with the use of the psychoanalytic notions of basic assumption group and of projective identification. With this procedure, we want at the same time to probe to which extent notions that are efficacious in psychoanalytic clinic can be useful to analyze and to understand situations that belong to the field of education, and in particular the classroom, seen here as a space for the production of psychic inter-occurrences. We try to think the intersubjective space according to a logic that considers the creation of a third party in teaching and learning. We introduce the notion of a "third voice" (Ogden) to denote the creation and re-creation of the intersubjective other with various effects on the subjective constitutions. The identitary stiffening, along with the attending disdain and intolerance to difference, can be a form of reacting to that which escapes from control and predictability, thereby weakening the transformational movements implicated in the process of learning.

The neural circuits activated in a person carrying out actions, expressing emotions, and experiencing sensations are activated also, automatically via a mirror neuron system, in the observer of those actions, emotions, and sensations. It is proposed that this finding of shared activation suggests a functional mechanism of “embodied simulation” that consists of the automatic, unconscious, and noninferential simulation in the observer of actions, emotions, and sensations carried out and experienced by the observed. It is proposed also that the shared neural activation pattern and the accompanying embodied simulation constitute a fundamental biological basis for understanding another's mind. The implications of this perspective for psychoanalysis are discussed, particularly regarding unconscious communication, projective identification, attunement, empathy, autism, therapeutic action, and transference-countertransference interactions.

Recalibrating Loewald's (1951) paper on 'Ego and Reality' widens my view and gives me a different / 'newer' perspective on discovering the ‘function’ of non-linear temporality and spatiality with ‘metapsychological’ and ‘clinical’ facet in psychoanalysis (Winnicott, 1955; Schmidt-Hellerau, 2002). Loewald’s (1951) theoretical framework of 'Time' saddened me a little. It makes me wonder how this aspect of 'Time' affects the ways in which the analyst and the analysand meet one another in the analytic situation in relation to Heidegger’s (2008) ‘Being and time.’ Furthermore, Heidegger's ideology of 'Being' and 'beings' intrigues me how intra-psychic and inter-psychic realities function 'inside' and 'outside' (Chasseguet-Smirgel, 1992) of the 'self,' the 'differentiated self,' and the 'integrated self' (Mahler & McDevitt, 1982) in the working-through (Freud, 1914) of the "archaic matrix of the Oedipus complex.” These psychic phenomena could be observed, co-created, and interpreted in the potential space (Winnicott, 1971) and object-relationships could be experienced and transformed through therapeutic action (Loewald, 1960) in the analytic process.

Group suicidal behaviour by young people has been attracting increasing worldwide attention, but the subject has rarely been studied from a clinical or psychodynamic perspective. Although etiological factors are not well understood, unconscious as well as conscious group processes likely contribute to self-destructive actions. In this article we discuss the role of projective identification in the development of suicidal behaviour by individuals who are part of a destructive group. We consider how these factors may operate, illustrated through a case description of a young man involved with a group of high-school students that included at least four who made serious suicide attempts. Recognition and understanding of these forms of communication have important implications for clinical practice and suicide prevention.

Background: Volumes have been published on “difficult” patients and their representatives; however, there is sparse literature available as to how a “difficult” patient or a provocative family encounter is experienced by a team of members across various disciplines, associated with the treatment. We report a case to present our experience with “potentates”, a type of “difficult” client, which could help draw suggestions to allow for prevention in more generalized situations.
Objective: To identify strategies that would help avoid occurrences and minimize the negative impacts possibly associated with the responses of the “potentates” towards the treatment team.
Method: The medical case of a 21-year-old female inpatient with provocative psychopathology was presented, initially evoked as a reaction towards her family followed by a state of intense anger and a tendency of being accusatory towards the treatment team during a family meeting. The patient’s response thus led the members of the treatment team to experience signs and symptoms commonly associated with virtual acute stress reaction (ASR).
Results: We analyzed the outcome of the interaction between the patient and the treatment team during the meeting, reviewed the literature relevant to pre-existing research in this domain, and concluded that there could be possible helpful strategies and measures that could be implemented in family meetings to prevent the possibility of virtual ASR. This case report paves the path for further research to ensure the protection of multidisciplinary teams under various clinical settings.
Discussion: A treatment team is potentially vulnerable to physical, verbal, psychodynamic and other commonly implemented modes of attack from patients and their representatives. Appropriate measures need to be implemented with the objective to prevent and minimize the effect of these attacks on the treatment team.

Ce texte propose une reflexion sur le role de l'identification projective (Klein) et de la fonction contenante (Bion) dans l'etablissement et la resolution d'une situation d'impasse relationnelle et de crise. Apres un apercu des principales descriptions psychanalytiques de ces concepts, deux vignettes cliniques tentent d'illustrer cette reflexion, en utilisant des relations tres problematiques vecues par deux professeurs d'enfants pre-psychotiques.

Am I writing angrily or are you reading angrily? When someone is morally outraged at a perceived injustice, where does the outrage stem from, the injustice or the person perceiving it? And even if it really is an injustice (who would guarantee this?), is being outraged productive or might we benefit from a Stoic approach?

This paper considers the complex task of working with adults with learning disabilities and challenging behaviour in a care home and the impact on relationships within the staff group and wider organisation. Examples are drawn from an organisational consultation to a home with a history of disputes, grievances and sick leave. The metaphor of ghosts is used to explore the processes by which the residents' own traumatic histories come to be played out by the care home staff. The paper concludes that an increased understanding of organisational processes in the residential care sector may help staff form more helpful relationships with service users and hence lead to better outcomes.

« Identifications, projections et identifications projectives dans les liens precoces. La partition prenatale. » Les concepts d'identification, de projection et d'identification projective jouent un role princeps dans les consultations familiales parents/bebe. Ils sont aussi de precieux outils pour explorer la partition prenatale des subtiles interrelations entre les processus de parentalite et de naitre humain. A partir de son experience clinique, l'auteur elabore une hypothese: la definition classique des «identifications projectives pathologiques» correspond bien aux variations psychiques de la normale de la mere suffisamment bonne en debut de grossesse. Les angoisses de malformation de la grossesse permettent d'illustrer cette hypothese.

The study focuses on emotional processes that may arise for practice educators when working with struggling or failing students in practice learning settings. Informed by a thematic review of the literature exploring the phenomenon of ‘failing to fail’, the study draws on two UK qualitative studies that highlighted the emotional distress experienced by practice educators when working with a marginal or failing student. The study draws key examples from these prior studies and argues that the psychoanalytic concept of projective identification offers a plausible and illuminating account of the states of mind experienced and reported by some practice educators in the ‘failing to fail’ dilemma. The notion is proffered as a conceptual framework for practice educators to explore and apply to their own practice as a means of making explicit unconscious states of mind, helping to recognise and rationalise these, thus supporting confidence in making appropriate assessment decisions.

A partir de extractos del análisis de un adolescente, se emprenderá una lectura  teórico-clínica con el propósito de poner en evidencia facetas de la contratransferencia, sea sobre sus efectos en el analista, sea en los usos que el analista puede hacer de esa experiencia. El caso clínico enfatiza los momentos de inicio y de terminación del análisis, con el objetivo de explicitar uno de los aspectos contratransferenciales involucrados en el trabajo con pacientes que fueron víctimas o autores de actos violentos.  El autor partirá de la idea de Racker sobre la necesidad de una "predisposición a identificarse con el analizando, que es la base de la comprensión", y llegará a otros autores que defienden la existencia de una contratransferencia previa o primordial. En el caso de las formas crudas de hostilidad presentadas por pacientes involucrados en actos de violencia, ese aspecto de la contratransferencia tiende a ser dificultado por el cierre defensivo del analista, lo que puede incluir un movimiento de negación de su propia violencia. Discutiremos cómo la apertura y el cierre a ese aspecto propicia o crea limitaciones para la reverencia del analista y para la capacidad de utilizar elementos de su propio mundo interno como indicadores de la experiencia psíquica comunicada por el paciente.

210 20 Minute  filmclips of political discussions with dyads of a healthy person interacting with somebody with a diagnosed mental distiurbance ( for example paranoid hallucinatory schicoprenia and 5 other groups were analysed in relation to facial exchange processes using EMFACS ( Emotional Facial Analyzing system) and related introspective phenomena. The interactionpartner were not informed about the disturbance . Healthy subjects under theamselves were acting as controlgroup.  The marked diffrences are shown and interpretd using affecttheory  and psychoanalytic defensc theory espicially proctive indentifiction as frame of thkinking.

OR theory offers the therapist a window into the “inner world” of
mental representations, how one represents, perceives and
understands their world and their relationship in it, that enables a
counsellor to explore the client’s behaviour and motivations (deepest unmet needs/longings). Such past representations seem to serve as emotional filters; colouring and shaping current intrapsychic perceptions and interpsychic relationships. Such relationsal perceptions best serve the therapeutic alliance and offer the analyst & analysands insights into what drives the couple’s relationship.