New Language for Psychoanalysis [Hardcover]

Roy Schafer (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1976

"Should be of considerable interest to a wider public, since it proposes a radical reformulation of psychoanalytical theory which, if accepted, would render outmoded almost all the analytical jargon that has crept into the language of progressive, enlightened post-Freudian people."-Charles Rycroft, The New York Review of Books "Schafer's arguments have considerable cogency. The tendency to over-theorize so that the translation of abstractions into the language of ordinary discourse between analyst and patient has become increasingly difficult is a fault; Schafer goes a long way towards redressing it, and his efforts to include meaning and the person in the form of his language is an achievement."-Michael Fordham, The Times Higher Education Supplement

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 432 pages
• Publisher: Yale University Press; First Edition edition (January 1, 1976)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300018940
• ISBN-13: 978-0300018943
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,846,143 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The voice of a generation redefines the oral tradition., May 1, 2009

By 

David Chirko (Sudbury, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A New Language for Psychoanalysis (Paperback)

"A New Language for Psychoanalysis" (1976) is a 394 page book by American psychologist/psychoanalyst Roy Schafer, Ph.D. (1922- ). Its preface explains it's about, "A reconceptualization...a new set of language rules...as much philosophic as psychoanalytic....a systematic alternative to the established language of psychoanalysis, its metapsychology....that....presupposes a...philosophy of science and..theory of knowledge." (Earlier, too, French theorist/psychiatrist/psychoanalyst Dr. Jacques Marie Emile Lacan, believing the unconscious was put together like a language, modified psychoanalysis by extending it to lingusitics and philosophy.)

According to 1973's "PsychoSources" edited by Evelyn Shapiro, if philosophy is defined as reflection it can reflect on what psychology does, questioning whether or not it's a science if it can't predict anything to the same degree as the natural sciences do. Further, in "Philosophy and Psycho-Analysis" (1953), John Wisdom, a British philosophy professor of language, mind and metaphysics, and formerly employed in industrial psychology, maintained that, "...of philosophers I have been hinting....at connections with what psycho-analysts try to bring into the light...philosophy has never been...a psychogenic disorder nor is...philosophical technique...a therapy. There's a difference. Philosophers reason for and against their doctrines and...show us not new things but old things anew. Nevertheless...noticing the connections...philosophical discussion is the bringing out of latent opposing forces like arriving at a decision...when the reasoning is done we find...besides the latent lingusitic sources...others non-lingusitic and much more hidden which subtly co-operate with...features of language to produce philosophies...." (In fact, American psychologist/biographer Leonard Zusne, in his "Names in the History of Psychology" [1975], proclaimed that such a delving of psychology goes back to the philosophy of 4th Century Greece, because "Aristotle is...regarded by many as the first psychologist".)

Metapsychology, according to "A Critical Dictionary of Psychoanalysis" (1968) by British psychiatrist/psychoanalyst Charles Rycroft, M.D., is a "Term invented by Freud to....describe mental phenomena...of...fictive PSYCHIC APPARATUS...ideally...the topographical referring to its location within the psychic apparatus, i.e. whether...ID, EGO, or SUPER-EGO, the dynamic to the INSTINCTS involved, and the economic to...distribution of ENERGY within the apparatus." Metapsychology then, works with abstraction that transcends the more scientific, empirical approach, enabling one to examine psychology philosophically. (Similar to my approach, elsewhere on amazon, in an earlier review of E.R. Emmet's "Learning to Philosophize".)

Connecting the linguistic with the philosophical to explain the psychological, I'll summarize what Schafer's volume says about all of this in relation to a new argot for psychoanalysis--making it more scientifically palatable.

First, there is a psychoanalytic vision of reality that blends four modes: the ironic mode--being objectively assiduous with the contradictory and indefinite related to the probing, introspective and determinative facets of analysis; and tragic mode--profoundly confronting the cost of conflicts, doubt, horror, loss and the unexplainable. Both modes are characteristic of the Freudian approach of dealing with internal reality. However, the comic mode--stressing hope to surmount life's hurdles and move forward; and the romantic mode--boldly attempting to free, cure and alter one's exterior situation in the process of analysis, must also be incorporated in order to embrace external reality more and purvey a fresh and total therapeutic vision.

Schafer believes that Austrian born American psychiatrist/ego psychologist/psychoanalyst Heinz Hartmann, M.D., is the bulwark of metapsychology. The latter assailed strict Freudian adherence to dualism, i.e., pleasure principle versus reality principle, by introducing the notion of degree therein. Hartmann also more precisely brought psychoanalytic theory within the context of biological adaptation, helpful when discussing, say, drives. He, as well, sought to make analytic thinking more accurate. For instance, pointing out that an analyst may be erudite about why memories are buried in the unconscious, but could be oblivious to the facts of normal memory function. Further, he successfully developed the concept of psychic energy for purposes of explanation, through its origins and movement which determined frameworks, functions, narcissism, reality relations, et al. Lastly, poignant is Hartmann's view of the psyche as a strong and organized government model, entailing meaningful choice reflecting its background and defending its integrity, but cooperating with others to eschew conflict.

Schafer finds anthropomorphism sculpted the language of psychoanalysis because of Freud's enslavement to the natural science model. For example, one's ego, or, the "I," is reduced to merely an organism, in lieu of being presented in a more humane light, clinically.

He speaks of action (whether physical or mental) language as a language model, through: claimed action or actions of a person--that which one does and causes to happen to them; versus: disclaimed action or situations acting on the person--that which a person has and causes them to act. People then, as Schafer illustrates, through the comparison with hysteria (and probably what Freud really meant), cause their own neurotic symptoms (the author, of course, alludes to existential analysis in such a context--go figure).

Schafer next covers the concept of internalization and declares it a spatial metaphor that cannot be utilized. This is because a mental function can't be specifically localized like something physical in nature. The author says that they are arduous to systematize, non substantial, quiescent and exist because we think they do; forget about the inside and outside when molding theory. He reexamines defense mechanisms like introjection and projection.

Regarding the concepts of self and identity, which have been variously used in the psychology literature as if they were substantive places, action language (above) is thus needed. Being abstract, there are those who endeavoured to employ these concepts in a more concrete manner.

Next, Schafer elaborates on action language by stating that mental processes and behaviour need not be elucidated through underlying motives and psychodynamics, because they could be comprehended better through reason, especially valuable for the analysand. Explanation and description as different entities would be expunged.

Then the author tackles resistance, employing his action language he presents it as a methodological moniker and not so much a technical problem, therefore analysis of it is actually a specific viewpoint of the process of psychoanalysis; the same would apply to transference, repetition, et al.

When dealing with emotions, Schafer believes revamping its lingo through action language, utilizing verbs and adverbs, not bodily and other kinds of metaphors. As well, he refers to deep/shallow emotions, leading to spatialization (see internalization, above); fleeting/enduring emotions, implying time indices; and emotions described through light/dark adjectives, etc. These must all be transformed into modes of action that can be characterized. Emotion, for Schafer, therefore is not an entity like psychic energy, but an enactment or emotion mode of action defined by a person in a situation; something done, not passively had, as they--the person--hate or love, etc.

The author ends by defending his abstract, reductionistic approach to language that may have been ensconced in a metapsychological realm, and concedes that it is still his discretion to test his theoretical action language clinically.

Finally, American cognitive scientist and professor Jerry Alan Fodor, Ph.D. (philosophy), in the Introduction to his book, "Psychological Explanation: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Psychology" (1968), remarked, "It...seems...implausible...to represent...concepts and theories...psychologists use in their accounts of behavior as unrelated to...the layman's understanding...." Well, Schafer brought to the astute layman a more lucid jargon to better comprehend theories and techniques of analysis. That's why you should look up "A New Language for Psychoanalysis" by Roy Schafer, where the voice of a generation redefines the oral tradition.