APRIL 2008

 

Escaping the Phantom’s Ghostly Grasp:

  On Psychoanalysis as a Performance Art in the Spirit World       
 

 Paper presentation by Patrick B. Kavanaugh, Ph.D.

 

ABSTRACT: Described as a madman-philosopher, a poet-dramatist, and a theorist-playwright, Antonin Artaud (1895-1948) wrote a collection of essays on the theatre during his nine years in various mental asylums in France in the 1930’s. Published in 1938, Le Theatre et son double  (The Theatre and Its Double) presented a revolutionary theory in which his metaphysical theatre replaces the psychological theatre of the West. In so doing, Artaud broke with the Aristotelean tradition of theatre and, influenced by an Oriental philosophy, introduced his metaphysical theatre as embodied in his Theatre of Cruelty.  His theatre enters a more dangerous kind of reality that looks beneath the mask of the civilized and demands that the audience viscerally see and speak with the more barbaric, primitive, and real aspects of self and other.

Escaping the Phantom’s Ghostly Grasp ... enters the Theatre of Cruelty as found on the in-patient unit of an inner city state hospital to consider the beginnings of a conversation with The Man From Venus. In so doing, this essay hopes to contribute to a more radical poetics of psychic theatre in which the stage of Artaud’s theatre presents us with another reality and space – a spiritual reality and space- from which we might speak with the ghosts of the spirit realm.

 

ABOUT THE PRESENTER: Dr. Kavanaugh is in the private practice of psychoanalysis in Farmington Hills, Michigan.

 

 

MARCH 2008

 

Listening With Yet Another Ear: 

Understanding and Utilizing the Nonverbal Voice in Psychotherapy

 

 Paper presentation by Sarah Docimo, B.A.

 

ABSTRACT: The nonverbal voice will be given a voice, so to speak, in this presentation as a powerful communicator of meaningful conscious and unconscious information in psychodynamic work. This presentation will attempt to explicate its relevance to patient and therapist communication as well as gather together and explore the literature and body of knowledge about the role of the nonverbal voice in the therapeutic process. How something is said has long been believed to be just as, if not more, meaningful than what is verbalized with words. Therapists are encouraged to listen for the manifest and latent voices of their patients, the latter representing the prosodic voice impregnated with tremendous unconscious and emotional meaning. In this way, the unconscious is literally speaking in every session, albeit attempting to disguise and entangle itself in verbal productions as is its nature, but it is still there waiting to be heard and understood within the transference relationship.

  

ABOUT THE PRESENTER: Sarah Docimo, B.A.  is a third year doctoral student in clinical psychology at the University of Detroit Mercy (UDM) and currently works at Oakland University’s Counseling Center and UDM’s Psychology Clinic as a psychodynamic psychotherapist and diagnostician. Her research interests include nonverbal communication, psychotherapy process and outcome, and transitional relatedness. 

 

 

FEBRUARY 2008

 

A Systematic Case Study of Psychoanalysis: Integrating Science & Practice

 

Paper presentation by John H. Porcerelli, Ph.D., ABPP

 

ABSTRACT:  To date, no known systematic case studies, effectiveness studies, or randomized control trials exist for psychoanalysis in the treatment of Avoidant Personality Disorder (AVPD). In this study of a psychoanalysis of 5 year's duration, self-reported symptoms, and observer-rated personality disorder (PD), global functioning, object relations, defense mechanisms, and psychological health were gathered at intake, yearly, and at 1-year follow-up.  Process data was also gathered to determine the extent to which the treatment adhered to psychodynamic, cognitive-behavioral, and interpersonal Therapy principles. The process and outcome findings, to be discussed in detail in the presentation, make clear that further investigation of psychoanalysis for AVPD is warranted. They further demonstrate the usefulness of assessing multiple domains of patient functioning and treatment process in case study research. The presentation will include some discussion of how systematic case studies may be a way to bridge the gap between clinical research and practice.

 

BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT:  John H. Porcerelli, PhD, ABPP is an Associate Professor and Director of Behavioral Science, Department of Family Medicine & Public Health Sciences at Wayne State University School of Medicine. His research includes the process and outcome in adult and adolescent psychotherapy, health effects of violence, and the physician-patient relationship. He maintains a private practice of psychotherapy and psychoanalysis in Birmingham, MI.  

 

 

JANUARY 2008

 

-A Fractured Fairytale-
The Story of Our Lives in the Kingdom of Positivism:
Our Loss of Historical Consciousness
 Paper presentation by Patrick B. Kavanaugh, Ph.D.

 

ABSTRACT:   “Once upon a time, a long time ago before the time of On-Star, Comcast, and Eminem, the first of several revolutions in healthcare took place in the Kingdom of Positivism, a kingdom located in the Foothills of Certainty near the Sea of Empirical Methodology. The kingdom’s first revolution ...” And so the story begins. This fractured fairytale is about the relationship between psychoanalytic practice and education on the one hand and the state on the other in the ancient Kingdom of Positivism. Within an historical-cultural context, it traces how the values and goals of the kingdom moved from interfacing with its psychological community to becoming inseparably entwined with its educational and practice philosophies leading, unfortunately, to ever-increasing difficulties in preserving spaces for psychoanalytic

education and practice. Would it be possible to regain their lost sense of historical consciousness and, once again, educate and practice outside of a healthcare matrix and ideology?

 

ABOUT THE PRESENTER:  Dr. Kavanaugh is a former president of the International Federation for Psychoanalytic Education, the Academy for the Study of the Psychoanalytic Arts, and the Michigan Society for Psychoanalytic Psychology. He teaches, consults and is in private practice in Farmington Hills, Michigan.