Culture-Breast in Psychoanalysis

<p>We are fed at the breast of culture not wholly but to differing degrees. <i>The Culture-Breast in Psychoanalysis: Cultural Experiences and the Clinic </i>focuses on the formative influence of cultural objects in our lives and the contribution such experiences make to our mental health and overall wellbeing.</p><p>The book introduces “the culture-breast” a new clinical concept to explore the central importance played by cultural objects in the psychical lives of patients and psychoanalytic clinical practitioners inside and outside the consulting room. Bringing together clinical writings from psychoanalysis and cultural objects from the applied fields of film art literature and music the book also makes an argument for the usefulness of encounters with cultural objects as “non-clinical case studies” in the training and further professional development of psychoanalysts and psychotherapists. Through its engagement with psychosocial studies this text furthermore interrogates challenges and offers a way through a hierarchical split that has become established in psychoanalysis between “clinical psychoanalysis” and “applied psychoanalysis”.</p><p>Combining approaches used in clinical academic and arts settings <i>The Culture-Breast in Psychoanalysis </i>is an essential resource for clinical practitioners of psychoanalysis psychotherapy counselling psychology and psychiatry. It will also be of interest to researchers and practitioners in the fields of psychosocial studies sociology social work cultural studies and the creative and performing arts.</p>