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Ronald Fairbairn’s Psychoanalytic Model of the Human Psyche and Its Clinical Applications

First Trimester of the Two-Year Program & Full Training Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis

(can be also taken as an individual post-graduate certificate course; no pre-requisites)

Course Instructors: David Celani, PhD and Jack Schwartz, PsyD, LCSW

Dates: October 8, 15, 22, 29; November 5, 12, 19; December 3, 10, 17 (Thursdays, 8:40pm – 9:55pm)

Tuition: $450 (can be paid in 2 installments, upon request). Registration: $25/course (waived for candidates in training) -
can be paid by CC via PayPal - follow the link: PayPal.Me/ORINYC . Additional registration fee ($25) for non-candidates.

Location: via Virtual participation only, due to current recommendations of CDC and local government (re: COVID-19).

Virtual participation is conducted via audio/video or audio mode only (with minimal technical requirements).

To Register for the course, follow the link HERE

COURSE DESCRIPTION: 

“the aim of psychoanalytic treatment is to effect breaches of the closed system which constitutes the patient's inner world, and thus to make this world accessible to the influence of outer reality” (Fairbairn, 1958, 380)

Part One. Course Instructor: David Celani, PhD

W. R. D. Fairbairn (1889-1964) challenged the dominance of Freud’s drive theory with a psychoanalytic theory based on the internalization of human relationships. Fairbairn assumed that the unconscious develops in childhood and contains dissociated memories of parental neglect, insensitivity, and outright abuse that are impossible for the children to tolerate consciously. In Fairbairn’s model, these dissociated memories protect developing children from recognizing how badly they are being treated and allow them to remain attached even to physically abusive parents.

In the first part of the course, David Celani will review Fairbairn’s foundational papers and outline their application in the clinical setting. He will discuss the four unconscious structures proposed by Fairbairn and will offer the clinicians concrete suggestions on how to recognize and respond to them effectively in the heat of the clinical interview. Dr. Celani will emphasize practical concepts of Fairbairn’s trauma theory, as well as the internalization of the therapist as a new “good” object.

Class 1: An introduction to Fairbairn and a Review of his First two Theoretical Papers

Readings:

Fairbairn, W.R.D. (1952). Psychoanalytic Studies of the Personality.  London. Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Chapter I: Schizoid Factors in the Personality (pp. 3-27).

Chapter II: A Revised Psychopathology of the Psychoses and Psychoneuroses (pp. 28-58).

Celani, D. (2010). Fairbairn’s Object Relations Theory in the Clinical Setting. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. (pp. 1-34)

Class 2: Fairbairn’s Trauma Theory

Readings:

Fairbairn, W.R.D. (1952). Psychoanalytic Studies of the Personality.  London. Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Chapter III: The Repression and the Return of Bad Objects (with special reference to the “war neuroses”)  (pp. 59-81).

Celani, D. (2010). Fairbairn’s Object Relations Theory in the Clinical Setting. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. (pp. 34-50)

Class 3: Fairbairn’s Structural Model, and its Application in the Treatment Setting

Readings:

Fairbairn, W.R.D. (1952). Psychoanalytic Studies of the Personality.  London. Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Chapter IV: Endopsychic Structure Considered in Terms of Object-Relationships (pp. 82-136).

Celani, D. (2010). Fairbairn’s Object Relations Theory in the Clinical Setting. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. (pp. 51-71 and pp. 85-115)

Class 4: A Practical Approach to Working  With Fairbairn’s Model

Readings:

Fairbairn (1958). On the nature and aims of psychoanalytical treatment.  International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 39, 374-385.  

Celani, D. (2010). Fairbairn’s Object Relations Theory in the Clinical Setting. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. (pp. 71-83 and pp. 117-213)

Skolnick, N. (2006). What’ s a good object to do? Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 16, 1-28.

Part Two. Course Instructor: Jack Schwartz, PsyD, LCSW

Building on the initial phase of the class we will cultivate a deeper understanding of the origins of object relations theory as proposed by Ronald W. Fairbairn, and its application in broader clinical practice, including dream interpretation.
Goal:  For the class participants to grasp both emotionally and intellectually Fairbairn’s model of psychic development, especially when applied to the clinical sphere.

Class 5. The origins of object relations has its roots in Freud's theory of unconscious repression and transference, then as part the structural theory of (id - ego - superego) of development.

Class 6. The class then enters the realm of object relations with the introduction of Melanie Klein’s work, and early object dynamics, projective identification and gratitude and envy, depressive and paranoid/schizoid positions.  Developmental grieving.

Class 7. Reviews Fairbairn’s first development of a true object relations model, review of Fairbairn the man, and why he was overlooked for so long.

Class 8. Follows the progression of Fairbairn’s ideas and their impact on other theories of development, such as Bowlby’s work on attachment, Heinz Kohut’s self psychology, and later – Jeff Seinfeld’s work on the ‘bad objects.”

Class 9. Will look at the clinical application of the Fairbairnian model of internalized object relations, open vs closed systems, the impact on relationships and the use of dreams.

Class 10. Will employ clinical materials and focus on the organic understanding of Fairbairn; s model, and the concepts of self-sabotage, bad objects, symptoms, treatment and resistance. Jeff Seinfeld’s work on “interpreting and holding” brings together the paternal and maternal function of the therapist, which emerges from Fairbairn’s work.

References  and Other Readings
 

Armstrong-Perlman, E.M., (1991). The allure of the bad object. Free Association, 2, 343-356.

Buckley, P. (Ed.). (1986). Essential papers in psychoanalysis. Essential papers on object relations. New York University Press.

Diaz, Juno, Waiting for spider man, New Yorker, 11/20/17, p.17. (example of Libidinal Ego creating a Exciting Object)

Fairbairn, W.R.D. (1952). Psychoanalytic Studies of the Personality.  London. Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Fairbairn, W.R.D. (1958). On the nature and aims of psycho-analytical treatment. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 39, 374-385.

Greenson, R.R. (1971). A dream while drowning. In: Explorations in Psychoanalysis (pp. 415-423). Madison, CT:  International Universities Press. 1978. (example of internalized ideal object)

Harrison, K. (1997). The kiss. New York: Random House. (memoir of a rejected child and her extreme attachment to bad object parents)

Mitchell, S.A. (2000). Relationality: From attachment to intersubjectivity. Hillsdale, NJ: The Analytic Press.

Ogden, T.H. (2010). Why read Fairbairn? International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 91, 101-108.

Schafer, R. (1998). Authority, evidence, and knowledge in the psychoanalytic relationship, In O. Renick (Ed.), Knowledge and authority in the psychoanalytic relationship (pp.227-244). Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

Seinfeld, J. (1990). The bad object . Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.

Skolnick, N.J., (2006). The analyst as a good object: a Fairbairnian perspective. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 16, 1-28.        

Skolnick, N.J., & Scharff, D.E. (Eds) (1998). Fairbairn, then and now. Hillsdale, NJ: Analytic Press.         

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