Psychoanalysis and Social Theory

Catalog description

This course will examine the work of European and North American thinkers who use psychoanalysis to understand the social in mostly Western contexts. We will mine the history of psychoanalytic thinking, from Freud onward, for what it can tell us about the social life of the psyche and the psychic life of society. What can the psychic forces and conflicts that psychoanalysis theorizes teach us about social forces and conflicts? What light does psychoanalysis cast on systems of collective belief such as magic and religion? What relationships can be discovered between parental and political authority, the nuclear family and the nation-state? Why might dissatisfaction with ourselves, disappointment with our parents, and frustration with those closest to us manifest as hatred of people whom we may never have met? A portion of the course will be dedicated to understanding what could be called the psychopathologies of social existence: xenophobia and race hatred, male domination and misogyny, nationalism and authoritarianism, etc. How do psychological, sexual, and socioeconomic factors interact to produce the ties that in binding also unravel us? Other topics to be covered include the prohibition of incest, the organization of reproduction and the family, and the Oedipus complex; feminist criticism and analysis of patriarchy and male domination; magic, religion, and “belief.” Readings will include works by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, Dorothy Dinnerstein, Sigmund Freud, and Wilhelm Reich, among others.