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DR. JEFFREY SEINFELD MEMORIAL     PSYCHOANALYTIC LICENSE     MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS  NEURO-PSYCHO-EDUCATION

Caesura, Thalassa, and Anxiety -- A Dialectical Playground with FREUD – FERENCZI – BION

Certificate Course with 12.5 hrs of post-graduate/ CE credits in psychoanalytic education; no pre-requisites
with Stefanie Teitelbaum, LCSW, NPsyA

Dates: April 12, 2018 - June 14, 2018, Thursdays, 7:45-9:00pm

Where: 43 E 10th St, 1B; New York, NY 10003  OR VIRTUALLY (with minimal technical requirements for in real time participation and/ or via use of video-taped sessions)

Tuition: $450/ 10-week course. Ask for our need-based scholarships and payment arrangements (call the administrator at 646-522-1056).

“There is much more continuity between intra-uterine life and earliest infancy than the impressive caesura of the act of birth would have us believe.” Freud, S. (1926). Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety.

“It can be accounted for simply enough biologically; for, just as the mother originally satisfied all the needs of the foctus through the apparatus of her own body, so now, after its birth, she continues to do so, though partly by other means. There is much more continuity between intra-uterine life and earliest infancy than the impressive caesura of the act of birth would have us believe. What happens is that the child's biological situation as a foetus is replaced for it by a psychical object-relation to its mother. But we must not forget that during its intra-uterine life the mother was not an object for the foetus, and that at that time there were no objects at all. It is obvious that in this scheme of things there is no place for the abreaction of the birth-trauma. We cannot find that anxiety has any function other than that of being a signal for the avoidance of a danger-situation.”  Freud, S. (1926). Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety.

In the paragraph immediately following this quotation, Freud references Ferenczi’s Thalassal regression, a longing for the womb.  This same Caesura quote fertilized Bion’s “Caesura” paper, where the concept is amplified to describe the experience of being joined and separated at the same time, and the experience of discomfort in a state of caesura. 

This course will explore Freud’s revision of his earlier theories of anxiety and his expansion of his theory of regression to prenatal and post natal experience. 

Each class will explore clinical vignettes with which students can experiment “being where the patient is” before, after, and within a caesura.

This course is structured to do close readings of selected passages in  three PRIMARY READINGS:

Bion, W.R.(1974). Caesura. In W. Bion, TWO PAPERS, GRID AND CAESURA. Karnac, London, 1989

Ferenczi, S.(1918). Thalassa, A Theory of Genitality. Maresfield Library, Karnac, London 1989

Freud, S. (1926). Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety. SE, Volume XX, 75-176.

ADDITIONAL READINGS will be referenced to amplify the primary readings:

Bion, W.R. (1970). Attention and interpretation (pp. 1-130). London: Tavistock.

Bianchedi, D.E.T.d., Antar, L.R., Bianchedi, D.M., Certifias, L.L.P.d., Neborak, O.S., Kaplan, D.A.G.d, et al. (1997, March 8, 2004). Pre-Natals / Post-Natals: The Total Personality: A memory of the future/The future of psychoanalysis. Retrieved from http://www.sicap.it/~merciai/bion/papers/bianc2.htm

Faimberg, H. (1989). T Zero: Waiting. International Review of Psycho-Analysis, 16, 101-108.

Ferenczi, S. (1955). Notes and fragments.  In Ferenczi (Moesbacher E. et al transl.), Final contributions to psychoanalytic theory. Brunner/Mazel, NY.

Ferenczi, S.(1929). The Unwelcome Child and his Death-Instinct.  International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 10, 125-129.

Freud, S. (1911). Formulations on the two principles of mental functioning. SE XII,213-226

Freud, S. (1905). Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905). SE VII, 123-246.

Maiello, S. (1995). The sound-object: A hypothesis about prenatal auditory experience and memory. Journal of Child Psychotherapy, 21, 23-41.          

Meltzer, D. (1990). The claustrum: An investigation of claustrophobic phenomena. Karnac Books Ltd..       

LEARNING POINTS:

After taking this course, participants will be able to:

1 - Discuss Freud’s revisions of his earlier theories of anxiety and clinical practice implications of those revisions presented in Inhibition, Symptoms and Anxiety, Part IV, “Anxiety produces repression.”

2 – Discuss Freud’s revisions of his earlier theories of anxiety and clinical practice implications of those revisions presented in Inhibition, Symptoms and Anxiety, Part VII, “Anxiety is a signal of dangerous separation.”

3 - Discuss Freud’s revisions of his earlier theories of anxiety and clinical practice implications of those revisions presented in Inhibition, Symptoms and Anxiety,  Part VIII, “Anxiety reproduces feelings of helplessness.”

4 - Discuss Freud’s revisions of his earlier theories of anxiety and clinical practice implications of those revisions presented in Inhibition, Symptoms and Anxiety,  Part XI, Addenda C – “Anxiety, pain and mourning.”

5  – Explain the difference and clinical practice implications between repression and defenses of the ego.

6 – Discuss Ferenczi’s extension and amplifications of Freud’s metatheory of regression to include longing for and fear of returning to the womb.

7 – Discuss the interplay of Freud, Ferenczi’s and Bion’s theories about fetal sense impressions and embryonic thinking.

8– Discuss the interplay of  Bion, Ferenczi’s Freud’s theories of the relationship of anxiety, sexuality and regression.

9 – Use imagery of embryonic experience in dreams and transference.

10– Discuss clinical implications Bion’s extended meaning of the caesura as being joined and separated at the same time.

11 – Discuss the interplay of  Ferenczi’s use of male and female as cosmic symbols, and Bion’s use of ♀ and ♂ for  container/contained symbols of experience being sexual and not sexual at the same time.

12- Use interpretations and interventions for caesura phenomena in clinical contact.

13 – Discuss the clinical implications of transference and interpretation when talk therapy encounters the analytic subject relating to the mother’s body.

In the paragraph immediately following this quotation, Freud references Ferenczi’s Thalassal regression, a longing for the womb.  This same Caesura quote fertilized Bion’s “Caesura” paper, where the concept amplified to describe the experience of being joined and separated at the same time.  This course will read selections from Freud, Ferenczi and Bion relevant to uterine/ embryonic experience.   Additionally, we will take these observations to look primitive mental states through embryonic and/or neo-natal vertices.  Participants will use case material to experiment with clinical interpretations and interventions viewed from those vertices.

Learning points:

After taking this course, participants will be able to:
1 – Discuss Freud, Ferenczi’s and Bion’s ideas about the intrauterine elements in personality.
2 – Discuss similarities, differences, and same/different at the same time of the three authors’ idea.
3 – Use imagery of the theoretical discussions to form clinical interventions with patients.

Main readings:

Bion, W.R. (1989). Caesura. In W.R. Bion, Two papers: The Grid and Caesura. London: Karnac.
Ferenczi, S. (1989). Thalassa: A Theory of Genitality. London: Karnac Books.
Freud, S. (1926). Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety. Standard Edition, 20, 87-175. 

Suggested readings:

Freud, A. (1936). The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense. New York: International Universities Press, 1966.
Freud, S. (1915). The unconscious. Standard Edition, 14, 166-215.
Freud, S. (1923). The ego and the id. Standard Edition, 19, 3-66. 
Sandler, J., & Sandler, A.-M. (1978). On the development of object relationships and affects. International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 59, 285-296. 

For the Bio of the Instructor, please follow the link HERE.

To register, follow the link HERE or contact the administrator at admin@orinyc.org.

For payments, please use one of the following: 1) PayPal.Me/ORINYC (using your own PayPal account or credit cards), 2) call the administrator (to 646-522-1056) with the credit card information (to be used with Square service); or 3) send the check (paid to ORI) to: ORI Administrator, 7515 187th Street, Fresh Meadows, NY 11366.

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