David Lichtenstein and Jamieson Webster: Jacques Lacan’s Return to Freud and its Clinical Implications II

Class, 6 Sessions: Tuesdays, January 7 – February 11, 2014 / 8-9:30pm
A common misconception concerning Jacques Lacan is that his work was inherently un-clinical— that he did not discuss clinical issues concerning technique or provide clinical cases— making him more of a philosopher or meta-theoretician. In this course, we hope to dispel this mischaracterization and begin with key clinical cases touched on by Lacan during his Seminars from 1952-1980, from Freud’s Little Hans and The Case of a Female Homosexual, to his discussion of cases by other psychoanalysts such as Ernst Kris, Ella Freeman Sharpe, and Joan Riviere. Through this reading of cases and Lacan’s often unknown and extensive commentary on them, we hope to touch on some key Lacanian concepts— the signifier, desire, castration, the Real, and feminine sexuality— in order to better grasp their place and function in clinical work, including situating Lacan’s criticism of the changes to technique in contemporary analysis.

While this is part II of an earlier course in 2012 that paired texts by Freud with Lacan’s commentary on them, it is not necessary to haveattended part I. The course is designed to meet all levels of knowledge regarding Lacan and Lacanian theory.

David Lichtenstein is a psychoanalyst in private practice in NY. He is on the faculty at CUNY’s doctoral program in clinical psychology; founding member of Apres-Coup Psychoanalytic Association; and editor of Division/Review, a quarterly publication on psychoanalysis by Division 39. He has written extensively on psychoanalysis, Lacan, his clinical work with children, art and politics.

Jamieson Webster is a psychoanalyst in private practice in NY. She teaches at Eugene Lang College at The New School and she supervises doctoral students in clinical psychology at the City University of New York. She is the author of The Life and Death of Psychoanalysis (Karnac 2011) and Stay, Illusion! (Pantheon 2013).

January 7th, 2014 – Introduction

January 14th, 2014 – Little Hans and The Logic of the Signifier

* Freud, S (1909) “Analysis of a Phobia in a Five Year Old Boy”

*Michelle Montrelay (1994) “Why Did You Tell Me I Love Mommy and That’s Why I’m Frightened When I Love You” American Imago 51: 213-227

*Cormac Gallagher “How to Read Freud’s Little Hans”

*Jacques Lacan Seminar XIII The Transference – Lecture 3.22.1961

*Jacques Lacan Seminar XVI From an other to an Other – Lecture 5.7.1969 and Lecture 5.14.1969

January 21st, 2014 – Ernst Kris and Desire in Psychoanalytic Technique

*Kris, E. (1951) “Ego Psychology and Interpretation in Psychoanalytic Therapy” Psychoanalytic Quarterly 20:15-30.

*Jacques Lacan Seminar I Freud’s Papers on Technique – p. 59-61

*Jacques Lacan Seminar III The Psychoses – p. 79-85

*Jacques Lacan “Direction of the Treatment and the Principle of its Power” in Ecrits, p. 500-502

Supplemental Reading

*Bruce Fink “Chapter 2: Lacan’s Critique of the Ego Psychology Troika” in Lacan to the Letter

*Jacques Lacan Seminar XIV The Logic of Fantasy – Lecture 3.8.1967

January 28th, 2014 – Ella Freeman Sharpe and The Concept of Castration

*Ella Freeman Sharpe (1951) “Chapter V: Analysis of a Single Dream” in Dream Analysis: A Practical Handbook for Psychoanalysts p. 125-148

*Jacques Lacan Seminar VI Desire and its Interpretation Lectures 1.14.1959-2.11.1959 (5 Lectures)

February 4th, 2014 – Freud’s Female Homosexual and the Question of Feminine Sexuality

* Freud, S. (1920) “The Psychogenesis of a Case of Homosexuality in a Woman”

*Jacques Lacan Seminar X Anxiety – Lecture 1.16.1963 and Lecture 1.23.1963

*Joan Riviere (1929) “Womanliness as Masquerade” IJP 10:303-313

*Jacques Lacan Seminar V The Formations of the Unconscious – Lecture 3.5.1958

*Jacques Lacan Seminar XIII The Transference – Lecture 4.27.1966

February 11th, 2014 – Conclusion