Culturally imposed trauma: The sleeping dog has awakened. Will psychoanalysis take heed?

Journal title PSICOTERAPIA E SCIENZE UMANE
Author/s Dorothy E. Holmes
Publishing Year 2021 Issue 2021/1
Language Italian Pages 8 P. 11-18 File size 275 KB
DOI 10.3280/PU2021-001002
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Psychoanalysis has given scant attention to cultural trauma. Three contributions to this deficiency are considered: (a) the continuing identification with our psychoanalytic fore- fathers’ silence regarding cultural trauma; (b) the authoritarian practices in psychoanalytic institutions that keep us overly focused on standard intrapsychic formulations to the near exclusion of cultural trauma; (c) the fact that work with cultural trauma is difficult. To do this work requires us to "buck the system". If we do so, we expose ourselves to toxic phenomena in a world still rife with cultural trauma. Psychoanalysts should be encouraged to face and analyze cultural traumas.

Keywords: Cultural trauma; Crimes against humanity; Psychoanalytic institutions; Authoritarianism; Difficulty in working with cultural trauma

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Dorothy E. Holmes, Il trauma culturale: il can che dorme si è svegliato. La psicoanalisi gli presterà attenzione? in "PSICOTERAPIA E SCIENZE UMANE" 1/2021, pp 11-18, DOI: 10.3280/PU2021-001002