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History and Psychoanalysis During the Postwar Period

General Programming

Cosponsors
  • New York Area Consortium for Intellectual and Cultural History
  • Columbia University Seminar on British History
  • The Psychoanalytic Studies Program at the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society
  • The Remarque Institute, New York University
  • The NCJW Women and Gender Studies Program and the History Department, Tel-Aviv University
  • University Seminars at Columbia
Notes
  • Free and open to the public
  • Seating is available on a first come first serve basis.

B&W portrait photo of Sigmund Freud

Organized by Prof. Michal Shapira, Tel Aviv University, and cosponsored by the New York Area Consortium for Intellectual and Cultural History.

Despite the continuous interest in psychoanalysis as a modern system of thought and interpretation, the history of the discipline and the study of analysts other than Sigmund Freud are still developing. This two-day conference will bring together historians, gender studies scholars, and psychoanalysts to explore the impact of the Second World War on psychoanalysis in the post-1945 era, and of psychoanalysis itself on different postwar societies and cultures. The conference will try to examine the question regarding the special relationship that psychoanalysis had with democracy and with democratization in the postwar period. More broadly, the conference will also reopen the question of how to do the history of psychoanalysis, with what archives, and which methodologies. The event will continue the discussion from a first conference in London (organized by Daniel Pick and Matt Ffytche in 2013) focusing on psychoanalysis in the age of totalitarianism and the Second World War. The London conference generated great interest from scholars across fields, and we will continue this discussion at the Heyman Center, Columbia University, 4-5 April 2014.

Presentations will be 20-minutes arranged in panels, followed by discussion, all in a plenary format

For questions please email [email protected].

Program

time8:45am - 9:30am EDT

Gathering and Introductions

time9:25am - 10:30am EDT

From War to Postwar
Chair

Michal Shapira

Senior Lecturer of History and Gender Studies

Tel Aviv University

"Questions of Brainwashing in the Age of Totalitarianism: From the Pursuit of the Nazi Mind to Cold War 'Thought Reform'"

Daniel Pick

Professor of History

Birkbeck College, University of London

time10:30am - 10:45am EDT

Break I

time10:45am - 12:45pm EDT

Panel 1: Postwar and Post-Colonialism
Chair

Susan Pedersen

Gouverneur Morris Professor of British History

Columbia University

"Between Postfascism and Postcolonialism: The Ethnopsychoanalysis of Paul Parin, Fritz Morgenthaler, and Goldy Parin-Matthèy"

Dagmar Herzog

Distinguished Professor of History

The Graduate Center, City University of New York

"Minds after Empire: British Experts and the Postcolonial Personality"

Erik Linstrum

Assistant Professor of History

University of Virginia

"French Radical Psychiatry and the Disoccupation of the Mind"

Camille Robcis

Assistant Professor of History

Cornell University

time12:45pm - 1:45pm EDT

Break II

time1:45pm - 3:00pm EDT

Panel 2: New Traditions and New Horizons
Chair

Bonnie Smith

Board of Governors Professor of History

Rutgers University

"Heinz Kohut and Erik Erikson: American Psychoanalysts"

Elizabeth Lunbeck

Nelson Tyrone, Jr Professor of History and Professor of Psychiatry

Vanderbilt University

"Democratizing Psychoanalysis in Postwar Britain and America"

Peter Mandler

Professor of Modern Cultural History, Bailey College Lecturer in History, Gonville and Caius College

University of Cambridge

time3:00pm - 3:30pm EDT

Break III

time3:30pm - 5:30pm EDT

Panel 3: Contextualizing Psychoanalysis and it Postwar Uses
Chair

Samuel Moyn

Professor of Law

Harvard University

"Psychoanalysis and the Paradoxes of Enlightenment"

George Makari

Director of the DeWitt Wallace Institute for the History of Psychiatry, Professor of Psychiatry

Weill Medical College of Cornell University

"Psychoanalysis as Holocaust Survivor"

Lewis Aron

Director of Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis

New York University

"Anxiety Weaponized: Dread in the Era of Cold War Politics"

Simon Taylor

PhD Candidate in History

Columbia University

time9:00am - 9:30am EDT

Gathering and Introductions

time9:30am - 11:00am EDT

Panel 1: Postwar Tensions; Pioneer Psychoanalysts
Chair

Moshe Sluhovsky

Vigevani Professor of European Studies

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

"'Communist,' 'Queer' and 'Mentally Twisted': J. Edgar Hoover's Demonization of Psychoanalysis"

Elizabeth Danto

Professor of Social Work

Hunter College and The Graduate Center, City University of New York

"Politics in a New Psychoanalytic Key in the Work of Robert J. Stoller: Sexual Excitement, Perversions and Gender"

John Forrester

Professor of History and Philosophy of Science

University of Cambridge

"The Jet-Propelled Couch: Robert Lindner and Postwar Psychoanalysis"

Ben Kafka

Associate Professor of Media Theory and History

New York University

time11:15am - 11:30am EDT

Break I

time11:30am - 1:00pm EDT

Panel 2: The Freud Museums in Vienna and London
Chair

Katja Guenther

Assistant Professor of History

Princeton University

"The Sigmund Freud Museum in London and its Archives"

Carol Seigel

Director

Freud Museum, London

"The Sigmund Freud Museum in Vienna and its Archives"

Rubén Gallo

Professor of Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Cultures

Princeton University

time1:00pm - 2:00pm EDT

Break II

time2:00pm - 3:45pm EDT

Panel 3: Psychoanalysis and Social Life
Chair

Guy Ortolano

Associate Professor of History

New York University

"Paying Attention with Marion Milner"

David Russell

Fellow and Tutor, Associate Professor of English

Corpus Christi College Oxford

"Society without The Father: Psychoanalytic Authority in Postwar Sociology"

Matt ffytche

Deputy Director of the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies

University of Essex

"The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child (the Journal): A Narrative of Postwar Psychoanalysis"

Nellie Thompson

Historian and Curator

New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute

Presenting jointly with Nellie Thompson

Helene Keable

Training and Supervising Analyst

New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute

time3:45pm - 4:15pm EDT

Break III

time4:15pm - 5:15pm EDT

Interview and Final Comments
Chair

Eli Zaretsky

Professor of History

The New School

Daniel Pick

Professor of History

Birkbeck College, University of London

Robert Jay Lifton

Lecturer in Psychiatry

Columbia University

Final Comments

Michal Shapira

Senior Lecturer of History and Gender Studies

Tel Aviv University

Participants
  • Lewis Aron Director of Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis New York University
  • Elizabeth Danto Professor of Social Work Hunter College and The Graduate Center, City University of New York
  • Matt ffytche Deputy Director of the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies University of Essex
  • John Forrester Professor of History and Philosophy of Science University of Cambridge
  • Rubén Gallo Professor of Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Cultures Princeton University
  • Katja Guenther Assistant Professor of History Princeton University
  • Dagmar Herzog Distinguished Professor of History The Graduate Center, City University of New York
  • Ben Kafka Associate Professor of Media Theory and History New York University
  • Gerald Izenberg Professor Emeritus, Department of History Washington University in St. Louis
  • Helene Keable Training and Supervising Analyst New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute
  • Robert Jay Lifton Lecturer in Psychiatry Columbia University
  • Erik Linstrum Assistant Professor of History University of Virginia
  • Elizabeth Lunbeck Nelson Tyrone, Jr Professor of History and Professor of Psychiatry Vanderbilt University
  • George Makari Director of the DeWitt Wallace Institute for the History of Psychiatry, Professor of Psychiatry Weill Medical College of Cornell University
  • Peter Mandler Professor of Modern Cultural History, Bailey College Lecturer in History, Gonville and Caius College University of Cambridge
  • Samuel Moyn Professor of Law Harvard University
  • Guy Ortolano Associate Professor of History New York University
  • Susan Pedersen Gouverneur Morris Professor of British History Columbia University
  • Daniel Pick Professor of History Birkbeck College, University of London
  • Camille Robcis Assistant Professor of History Cornell University
  • David Russell Fellow and Tutor, Associate Professor of English Corpus Christi College Oxford
  • Carol Seigel Director Freud Museum, London
  • Michal Shapira Senior Lecturer of History and Gender Studies Tel Aviv University
  • Moshe Sluhovsky Vigevani Professor of European Studies The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
  • Bonnie Smith Board of Governors Professor of History Rutgers University
  • Simon Taylor PhD Candidate in History Columbia University
  • Nellie Thompson Historian and Curator New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute
  • Eli Zaretsky Professor of History The New School