Optional Spring Course - (This course id sadly presently unavailable)
30 credits
Tutor: Samuel Knafo
This seminar examines the contribution of psychoanalysis to social and political thought. Since the pioneering work of Freud, at the beginning of the century, psychoanalysis has had a significant influence over various traditions of political theory. Its focus on the way in which individuals relate to broader social structures has offered a distinctive viewpoint on socio-political issues, exploring notably the ways in which people unconsciously relate and take part in social dynamics. The distinctive contribution of Psychoanalysis has thus been to offer rich discussions of the way social dynamics are constructed and experienced from the perspective of people's subjectivity.
The seminar addresses more specifically the relationship between subjectivity, identity and the unconscious tracing the ways in which power is exerted and experienced at this level. To do so, the seminar will introduce and examines the work of major thinkers within or related to the tradition of psychoanalysis such as Freud, Fromm, Marcuse, Castoriadis, Lacan, Zizek, Lasch and Butler.
Preliminary reading
- Freud, Sigmund (1991) Civilization, Society and Religion: Group Psychology, Civilization and its Discontents and Other Works, Harmondsworth: Penguin.
- Lacan, Jacques (1977) Ecrits: A Selection, London, Tavistock.
- Castoriadis, Cornélius (1987) The Imaginary Institution of Society, Cambridge: Polity Press.
- Reich, Wilhelm (1946/70) The Mass Psychology of Fascism, NY, Farrar.
- Mitchell, Stephen and Margaret Black (1995) Freud and Beyond: A History of Modern Psychoanalytic Though, New York, Basic Books.
- Frosh (1999) The Politics of Psychoanalysis: An Introduction to Freudian and Post-Freudian Theory, NY, New York University Press
- Marcuse, Herbert (1962) Eros and Civilization : a Philosophical Inquiry into Freud, New York: Vintage Press.
-Moscovici, Serge (1986) The Age of the Crowd : a Historical Treatise on Mass Psychology, Cambridge: CUP.
- Richards, Barry (ed.) (1984) Capitalism and Infancy: Essays on the Psychoanalysis and Politics, New Jersey, Humanities Press
- Mitchell, Juliet (1974) Psychoanalysis and Feminism, London, Allen Lane.
- Butler, Judith (1997) The Psychic Life of Power: Theories in Subjection, Stanford U.P.
- Lichtman, Richard (1982) The Production of Desire: The Introduction of Psychoanalsysis into Marxist Theory, New York: Free press.
- Elliott, Anthony and Stephen Frosh (eds.) (1995) Psychoanalysis in Contexts: Paths between Theory and Modern Culture, London, Routledge.
- Rustin, Michael (1991) The Good Society and the Inner World: Psychoanalysis , Politics and Culture, London, Verso.
-Jameson, Fredric (1989) The Ideologies of Theory: Essays 1971-1986 (Vol. 1 and 2), Minneapolis, University of Minesota Press.
-Zizek, Slavoj(1999) The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre of Political Ontology, London: Verso.