On the Theory and Clinic of Lacanian Psychoanalysis

Chris Vanderwees, PhD, RP is a psychoanalyst, registered psychotherapist, and clinical supervisor at St. John the Compassionate Mission in Toronto, Canada.

“This lively and informative book offers a fascinating panorama of Lacanian psychoanalysis, full of both conceptual developments and personal vignettes. Well-known Lacanian analysts speak of their own experience and practice, making complex psychoanalytic ideas accessible and showing their relevance to clinical work, as well as giving an insight into the personal trajectories of the clinician.”— Darian Leader, psychoanalyst; author, Strictly Bipolar and Is It Ever Just Sex? “What is Lacanian psychoanalysis, and how is it practiced? This fundamental yet deceptively simple question is explored in Chris Vanderwees’ new volume in ways that expose the imaginary order projections that play a role in shaping our answers to this question. Serving as a companion book to On the History and Transmission of Lacanian Psychoanalysis, this collection of interviews with prominent Lacanian analysts lays bare what is essential to Lacanian psychoanalysis as a living clinical praxis. From work in private practice to barrios to crisis centers and with a variety of types of suffering, what comes to the fore is a plurality of analytic styles and approaches suited to the singularity of the patient and situated within a particular context.”— Stephanie Swales, psychoanalyst, Dublin City University; co-author, Psychoanalysing Ambivalence with Freud and Lacan: On and Off the Couch “This collection of powerful interviews sheds new light on what is possible for the human being when psychoanalysis offers the subject (in its suffering) a space that supports true speech. Refreshingly, the dialogues in this book make clear how various subject positions (e.g. psychotic, addict, trans) continue to expand the boundaries of psychoanalysis itself.”— Bret Fimiani, clinical psychologist; author, Psychosis and Extreme States: An Ethic for Treatment “Chris Vanderwees has written an exquisite volume on the theory and clinic of Lacanian psychoanalysis! True to the Freudian-Lacanian psychoanalytic method, Vanderwees uses free association to guide interviews with key figures in the Lacanian field. Offering glimpses into the worlds of Lacanian clinicians, this book reads like an intimate exploration of the foundational ideas guiding psychoanalytic practice today. The volume ends with a fascinating interview with Sylvia Lacan.”— Sheila L. Cavanagh, Professor, York University, Canada “Chris Vanderwees reminds us that 'there can be no single Lacan', in the preamble to this invigorating series of free association-sparked conversations conducted with many of the most eminent Lacanian analysts working today. That this is the case soon becomes abundantly clear in these wide-ranging and enlightening dialogues, which provide detail and texture to primary concepts in psychoanalysis - dreams, desire, trauma, the unary trait, the role of names, etc. - while foregrounding a series of new or previously under-emphasized priorities, such as transsexuality, historical consciousness, queer thanatology, the 'missed encounter', and more. This is something which Vanderwees intuitively grasps: the Lacanian field can only viably exist in such a distributed manner, by responding to, and being applied in, a wide variety of differing clinical and treatment contexts. Vanderwees sketches for us the landscape of this Lacanian field not only as it exists today but in view of the clinical challenges of an already arrived future.”— Derek Hook, Associate Professor of Psychology, Duquesne University; author, Six Moments in Lacan

• 1. Dreams, Transference, and Clinical Work: A Conversation with Christopher Meyer 2. On Seminar VI: Desire and Its Interpretation: A Conversation with Bruce Fink 3. Trauma or the Missed Encounter with the Real: A Conversation with Annie G. Rogers 4. Hysteria, Das Unbehagen, and Breathing: A Conversation with Jamieson Webster 5. A Few Slices: Analysis, Poverty, and Sexuality, An Interview with Patricia Gherovici 6. On Cancer Experience and the Resonance of Proper Names: An Interview with Mavis Himes 7. Precariousness and Therapeutic Landscapes: A Conversation with Hilda Fernandez-Alvarez 8. Through Social Work to Psychoanalysis, Critical Sexology, and Death Studies with Ricky Varghese 9. Practice is a Matter of Art: Interview with Betty Milan 10. Hand Grenade Film: On the Cut and Adieu Lacan with Richard C. Ledes 11. APPENDIX I: Selections from Absence to Presence: The Life History of Sylvia [Bataille] Lacan, Jamer Hunt 12. APPENDIX II: Dialogical Explorations of the History of Lacanian Psychoanalysis: An Interview with Chris Vanderwees