Object Relations Theory

Catalog description

The Object Relations Theory and Therapy course will familiarize students with the major theories that developed primarily by the British Independent group of psychoanalysts in the first half of the twentieth century. These object relations theories influenced the evolution of psychoanalysis. A major contemporary trend known as relational psychoanalysis is a direct outgrowth of the writings of those early psychoanalysts. The course will discuss the early contributors to Object Relations Theory, including Melanie Klein, Wilfred Bion, W.R.D. Fairbairn, Harry Guntrip, D.W. Winnicott, and John Bowlby. Each class will integrate clinical material that will be discussed in the context of that day's reading material. In addition to the early contributors to object relations theory, we will read and discuss the work of contemporary writers who have been directly influenced by the early object relations psychoanalysts. These writers include Christopher Bollas, Thomas Ogden, David Scharff and Jill Savage Scharff, and Stephen Mitchell. We will continuously try to understand how theory influences our clinical applications using clinical material from recent and ongoing cases.