Play, Gender, Therapy

Nellie L. Thompson, Ph.D., is an historian and member of the New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute, where she is the Curator of the Archives & Special Collections of the A.A. Brill Library. She has published papers on early women psychoanalysts (Phyllis Greenacre, Helene Deutsch, Marie Bonaparte, Edith Jacobson), the contributions of emigre analysts to American psychoanalysis and the relations of D.W. Winnicott with American analysts. She is a member of the Board of the Sigmund Freud Archives and the editorial Board of American Imago.

'Nellie L. Thompson, in creating this richly layered book, has foregrounded Eleanor Galenson's innovative contributions as psychoanalyst and passionate observer of small children so that her powerful insights are immediately relevant today. Galenson's scholarship is highlighted in her wide integration of theories from neighbouring fields and, using extended clinical illustrations, she deepens our understanding of how the processes of early play, gender awareness, and symbolisation can combine to form a developmental line of psychosexual and object-relations development, thereby extending Freud's views. Theorising from richly textured, vivid observations of infants, Galenson also pioneered a therapeutic approach to help infants suffering from severe disturbance in the parent-infant relationship: the combined intensive dyadic sessions with individual sessions for parents brought results that one would not have believed possible. Nellie Thompson in turn succeeds in an enduring contribution to psychoanalytic and developmental scholarship.'- Frances Thomson-Salo, Associate Professor, Past President of the Australian Psychoanalytical Society and Honorary Fellow, University of Melbourne Department of Psychiatry'Eleanor Galenson's research and clinical work demonstrated an early childhood sexual phase at two years, the presence of unresolved parental regression, and the revival of early maternal and infantile self-representations during pregnancy and child-raising. Nellie L. Thompson's lucid introduction and biography appropriately set the historical, institutional, scientific, and social context for Galenson's achievement. Thompson has done all who work with children and the entire mental health profession an invaluable service by bringing together the original classic papers of Eleanor Galenson, a groundbreaking pioneer clinician and childhood researcher.'- Professor Peter Loewenberg, UCLA; past Dean, New Center for Psychoanalysis, Los Angeles

• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ABOUT THE EDITOR AND CONTRIBUTORS INTRODUCTION - Nellie L. ThompsonPROLOGUE Interview with Eleanor Galenson - Milton SennPROLOGUE Our children, our future: li a conversation with Eleanor Galenson - Lucy LaFargePART I SYMBOLISATION, THOUGHT, AND LANGUAGE Introduction to Part 1 - Patricia Nachman CHAPTER ONE A consideration of the nature of thought in childhood play - Eleanor Galenson Discussion of Chapter One - Phyllis Greenacre CHAPTER TWO The impact of early sexual discovery on mood, defensive organisation, and symbolisation - Eleanor Galenson and Herman Roiphe Discussion of Chapter Two - Phyllis Greenacre CHAPTER THREE The influence of hostile aggression on the development of expressive language - Eleanor GalensonPART II INFANTILE ORIGINS OF SEXUAL IDENTITY Introduction to Part II - Lucy LaFarge CHAPTER FOUR Early genital activity and the castration complex - Herman Roiphe and Eleanor Galenson CHAPTER FIVE Object loss and early sexual development - Eleanor Galenson and Herman Roiphe Discussion of Chapter Five - Albert Solnit CHAPTER SIX Observation of early infantile sexual and erotic development - Eleanor Galenson CHAPTER SEVEN Review of The Infantile Origins of Sexual Identity - Elizabeth Lloyd Mayer CHAPTER EIGHT Review of The Infantile Origins of Sexual Identity - Jerome D. OremlandPART III THE TRIPARTITE THERAPEUTIC MODEL CHAPTER NINE Treatment of psychological disorders of early childhood: a tripartite therapeutic model - Eleanor Galenson CHAPTER TEN Gender disturbance in a three-and-a-half-year-old boy - Eleanor Galenson and Barbara Fields CHAPTER ELEVEN Psychoanalytic approach to psychotic disturbances in very young children: a clinical report - Eleanor GalensonINDEX