Lacan and Culturalism: A Chronicle of an "Untimely" Resistance to Psychoanalysis

Although neither Sigmund Freud nor Jacques Lacan ever neglected the place of culture and the social field for the subject, they always opposed "culturalist" ideas, even when such ideas no longer used this label. It is important to examine what both of these figures said about culturalism, but it is just as pertinent to return to other criticisms of this movement, which developed in the United States during the last century, because at present this movement has returned covertly within French psychoanalysis. First, "culturalism" is neither a specifically American problem nor one that belongs to the past. Second, some decisive criticisms of this movement remain both germane and original: they are able to throw light on a theoretical current that, at least in France, now characterizes a dominant orientation of psychoanalytic work. Third, although Lacan himself foresaw it, the misuse of some of his notions has unexpectedly served as a Trojan horse that has enabled culturalism to return.

REALIZATIONAL PERSPECTIVES: BION'S PSYCHOANALYSIS AND DOGEN'S ZEN

The author discusses similarities, differences and identities between the later work of the psychoanalyst Wilfred Bion and the Soto Zen Buddhist teacher Eihei Dogen. The discussion elaborates points that help to explain the interest in Bion by psychoanalysts who work to integrate Buddhism and psychoanalysis. Four major points of convergence structure this discussion. They include: a radical openness to unknowing; a shared orientation to the relation between intuition and cognition; a shift from attention to static mind states to an emphasis on fluid functions and actional relationships; and a radically experiential orientation rooted in the present moment.

Childbirth and Trauma, 1940s-1980s

This article analyzes trauma in mid-twentieth century hospital births, focusing on the United States, but with additional evidence drawn from Great Britain and France. As many as half of women today experience childbirth as traumatic and no evidence suggests that the figure was lower a half-century ago. Drawing on women's birth narratives and psychiatric literature, this article highlights the striking consistency over time in how women describe their experiences of traumatic birth. By the 1970s, however, women proved less ready to accept their trauma as the product of their own psychological shortcomings. Under the sway of second-wave feminism, they pushed back against care they defined as inhumane in both conventional maternity care and in natural childbirth. Psychiatry too demonstrates change over time. Hegemonic at midcentury, Freudian thinking began to yield to critiques that questioned gender norms and the preeminence of the subconscious. Based on private letters to maternity caregivers and between physicians, as well as a wide array of medical journal articles, popular magazines, and newsletters from childbirth education and birth advocacy organizations, this article argues that, despite different approaches to trauma in birth and clarity about how best to minimize it, contemporary maternity care has to date proven unable to heed the lessons of history.