Customer Reviews

Banished Knowledge: Facing Childhood Injuries

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Several years ago while I was an undergraduate majoring in Mental Health, I read Banished Knowledge. At the time I was also engaged in personal psychotherapy, getting in touch with the traumas of my past. Banished Knowledge was the first book I read that really "put it out there". No glossing over issues, no excuses for errs committed by others, no shiny marketing techniques to make the subject more palatable- Alice Miller just stuck the truth right out there. the book changed my life. Now, after completing a master's degree in counseling, Banished Knowledge is still the book I most reccomend. Not only does Alice Miller eloquently describe what trauma is, but she describes the differnce between blame and accountability when attempting to understand one's perpetrator. At times, the truth is hard, but the victory of understanding one's own wounds is freeing in the end.

First let me begin by saying that I really have enjoyed and learned from Miller's other works. They have been important text's for those of us not in "practice". So it was with high expectations that I purchased Banished Knowledge. After reading the first couple of chapters, I came to the conclusion that this book was more of a polemical text meant for the psychoanalsyst community then it was for the layperson. By the end of the book I was convinced that this was the case. However, I did find nuggets interspersed throughout the book that made the book at least worth reading if not completely satisfactory. If you are interested in purchasing this book with the expectations of, say, Drama of the Gifted Child just be prepared to find the writing written in a tone that seeks an audience not usually intended for her other works.

Miller may make some extreme and perhaps unsupportable statements now and then, and don't expect a course in scientific method on every page, but her books lay out how the mind works more clearly and thoroughly than anything else I know of. Trying to understand the child, or the parent, or the mind, or trauma, or yourself without thoroughly digesting Miller is really unthinkable. Other excellent books by Miller include Drama of the Gifted Child (also called "Prisoners of Childhood") [read the original version, currently available only in hardcover] and For Your Own Good. As for other authors, important works on childhood trauma include Making Sense of Suffering by J. Konrad Stettbacher, Betrayal Trauma by Jennifer Freyd, and Soul Murder by Morton Schatzman (don't confuse this latter book with one of the same title by Leonard Schengold). Schatzman's book is inexplicably out of print, but it's worth getting from the library. An excellent, simple, and highly practical book is Toxic Parents by Susan Forward.

If society is seriously interested in declining child abuse it must stop trivializing the fact, read "Banished Knowledge," by Alice Miller, to comprehend the consequences, then proceed and support the need. Then, and only then, will they comprehend that psychologists who try to help are practicing with the limitation of arcane theories, mostly without having personal experience about the subject. In too many cases theories are missing the point and are forcing victims to accept the training of a Ph.D. as salubrious. Two years ago, discouraged and disappointed I ended my twelfth session with a psychologist after she tried different theoretical approaches, when she asked helplessly, "What kind of theory fits you?" In my desperation to relieve the pain of memory I was pressed into obscure methods, declared as the only way or solution. In this kind of approach, again, harm is done. My personal experience with format theories like "one fits all," had lead me to more desperation than healing. Because self censoring psychologists approach child abuse with dogmas, instead of listening for an eventual true lead, they should find individual methods for the painful experience expressed by the victim in a descriptive way. I do not knock the honest attempt of scientific studies, which I trust, someday, will lead to more insight into this human behavior; on the contrary, I urge Psychology to recognize that all scientific approaches are developed by individual minds. In spite of all knowledge available, everything we do has limitations, and the possibilities of errors are influencing the result. We must consider these facts before we imply otherwise and call others wrong. Having experienced verbal, mental, physical and spiritual abuse, molestation, rape, incest and the horror of being sold into slavery as a child, I challenge all researchers to find acceptable new ways with more concern for the abused individual in seeing old methods with more criticism and adopting other new! ly known theories, as Alice Miller has done. Progress or improvement cannot be reached by continually using existing theories of psychological approach, which were by honest observation unsuccessful. Psychology should objectively consider the statements by studied individuals as guidelines, instead of seeking desperately convenient, society- pleasing or self-glorifying solutions, and establishing dogmas which are closing forever doors for future developments or final solutions about this unbalanced human behavior of child abuse. I agree wholeheartedly with Alice Miller's theory described in "Banished Knowledge" for this simple reason, it applies to me.

Any book recommended by my oldest daughter is one I will read, so I not only bought Miller's book as soon as I received my daughter's e-mail, I read it completely the first night. Miller is talented and competent. This book is exceptionally important, and reminds me of errors I made with my own children, but it makes the serious mistake of employing an extremist single-think, no-exceptions presentation. Miller's constant use of "all," "no exceptions," "never," "absolutely none," etc., is a major flaw in thinking, and very unscientific. Obviously, since she hasn't seen all cases, she can't classify all cases. Her writing thus takes on a tone of fanaticism and pseudo-religious faith in her "one true principle" -- her "sole explanation" for all instances -- allowing for no exception.

In addition to the one principle she expounds so well, any psychologist can easily think of other principles, causes and conditions that her single-minded hypothesis ignores.

In sum, though Miller states her single-think point exceptionally well, she ignores or sweeps too much else under the rug.

This is the first book I have read by Alice Miller and the first I've read on childhood abuse. It is written in easy to understand language and gets the point across VERY well. Ms. Miller does make a few statements that are hard to swallow, but she goes on to explain them and certainly doesn't tell you that you HAVE to believe them. This book is a must read for anyone who has suffered any type of childhood abuse.

I came across this book at a local bookstore last weekend just out of curiosity, and the thing that caught my attention was the title itself: "Banished Knowledge." I began to wonder: what kind of knowledge that this author was addressing. Then, I looked through it and it was about a knowledge lost to oneself due to trauma in childhood. And, this book was also about facing one's abused childhood in order to be freed from repressed emotions. This book is a second book by Alice Miller that I have read, with the first being Drama of the Gifted Child. I was a bit skeptical when reading "Banished Knowledge," but there is some good information that lies within.

I do agree with Miller when she said: "repressed pain blocks emotional life and leads to physical symptoms" (p. 161). There are many of us to blocked out memories from childhood that leads to dissociative states, and we tend to act out or act in a way seems unnatural to ourselves and to others. And, because we repressed our emotions, either from our childhood or present time, we would become sick in some aspects. Our emotions do indeed affect our physical bodies.

"Banished Knowledge" is short, with 180 pages, and has nine chapters with an appendix. It is fairly easy to read, but it can be little tough to understand. But, there are nuggets of truth in this book that may or may not help one to face fears stem from one's childhood. I do recommend this book for those who are searching for self-identity. Judge for yourself on how this book affects you, and if you feel anger, then you found one of the repressed emotions leading back to your childhood.

This book will not hold all of the information that will save you from pain/trauma, but it at least will have some truth for you as part of your self-discovery.

No writer has had more of an impact on me than Alice Miller, but the more I grow, the more I realize her limits.

This book's strength is that Alice Miller understands and beautifully labels the devastating causes and effects of extreme child abuse. Its weakness is that she doesn't realize that these extreme cases are just the tip of the iceberg. And it's a big iceberg.

Although part of Alice Miller is most certainly enlightened, which explains why so much of her writing rings true, part of her remains clouded by denial. In Banished Knowledge her denial hinges on her false belief that she is fully enlightened. In the 1990 edition she repeatedly and confidently states that she has resolved all her own repressed traumas through the therapy method of J. Konrad Stettbacher.

Although this is patently untrue, it is convenient for her to believe because it protects her from her own buried pain. This allows her to radically underestimate the significance of the abuse she herself suffered in her own childhood - and she herself perpetrated on her own two children in her adulthood. After all, parents in any degree of denial cannot help but act out their repressed traumas onto their children, which by nature is abusive to the spirit of the child. This is the repetition compulsion which she herself so aptly elucidates in her other works. This is how I know Alice Miller abused her own children. I learned it by applying the best of her theory to herself.

Although she hints obliquely at her own abusiveness as a mother, her denial prevents her from looking it squarely in the eye...let alone studying her own shadow with the penetrating ferocity that made her famous. Thus, by extension she is unable to study the shadows of those like her, that is, the overwhelming majority of parents. She lets them off the hook the same way she lets herself off the hook.

This is why she tacitly grants non-enlightened parents her consent to procreate - despite it being an inherent recipe for abuse. And she certainly never says "don't have children!" She unconsciously recognizes that it would be hypocritical of her to condemn others for doing what she herself did - and is still unable to acknowledge having done.

No wonder Alice Miller has so many parents as followers. She is a safe leader - and certainly better than most. Although she does provide some enlightened guidance - which is why I was drawn to her in the first place and drank up her books for so long - at the same time she allows them to rest comfortably assured that she will never challenge their basic pathological motive for procreating.

Interestingly, a few years after writing Banished Knowledge, Alice Miller came to her senses and took the evolutionary step of publicly repudiating her idol Stettbacher as manipulative and destructive. In time she also came to acknowledge her own lack of full enlightenment.

Nevertheless, she still managed to find a way to protect her idealization of herself as a parent, and again, by extension, to give damaged people her tacit consent to procreate. She accomplished this by stating (in the last paragraph of the afterward of the 1997 edition of "Drama of the Gifted Child") that full inner healing is impossible and the desire to accomplish this is "hubris." Thus, if full healing is impossible, then some degree of repression and inner pathology is inevitable in everyone - and so, therefore is child abuse. And therefore she has no right to criticize it.

Wrong! The search to know oneself fully is not hubris! Terrifying, yes. Gutsy, yes. Overwhelming, at times, yes. And maybe even impossible for Alice Miller, given her advanced age, severe childhood history, and persistent rigidity.

But hubris for everyone: no! The real hubris is that Alice Miller so readily universalizes her own limited experience to all of humanity.

Here is the truth: Healing is possible. Full enlightenment is possible. And so is an end to all child abuse. Even mild child abuse.

And I guarantee that if Alice Miller were healthier she would be the first to agree.

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding... the prophet

I checked this book out from the library the words "Banished Knowledge" intrigued me 1990 version. Already knew most of what was written but to have someone else actually write it wow! She had the courage, Thank you!

reading Saint Nicholas part made me furious. Furious because I have seen it before in churches, in blackmailing & bribing for behavior, or just plain "because" no reason at all. What makes it worst is that I don't stop them from hurting their child, they usually kill the messenger and don't want to see the truth.

The excerpt "The Child Sets Limits" to open eyes gently. That was a great positive side of a book that explores the truth.

I cried on page 79 child: "she has no choice but to accept any closeness she is offered rather than be destroyed."

I'm grateful for a mother who at least mentioned to me all the mistakes she has done rasing us. And all the mistakes she is making now. Specially saying NO just because she felt like she needed control. She blames herself for anything we "her children do wrong"

P.S. I agree with her on the autism and if one is to research for the truth; One would find that many illnesses are because of emotional states. Taboo subjects always makes people angry!

Reading many Alice Miller's books including Banished Knowledge one can learn that the key to understanding cruel dictators is to look into their histories and look for evidence of their own cruel mistreatment. Dictators are individuals who were tormented as children and were never given the opportunity to experience their authentic feelings including their shame, hatred, and rage regarding their torments. As adults, they generally idealize their abusive childhoods and believe it was done for "their own good."
Alice Miller states, "Many people still have no idea that they are placing dynamite in our world when they abuse their children." These people who were mistreated as children can mistreat themselves and/or others unless they have an "enlightened witness" in their life who helps them to condemn the abuse. Adults who defend their abusive parents are at greater risk of bringing harm to themselves or others.
Her books helps to understand that every individual has an ethical responsibility to look deep within himself and become more conscious of how his past is affecting his relationship with himself and others. This inner journey, discovering the truths about our childhoods and not recreating the bad elements in our current relationships, is a form of psychological activism through which we can protect the world from further violence.
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