Homosexualities

Elda Abrevaya trained in the Psychoanalytic Society of Paris (SPP) and is a training analyst of the Istanbul Psychoanalytic Association. She has worked as a professor in the Psychology Department of the University of Puerto Rico and in a Mental Health Center there. Her clinical experience in this setting has been the subject of three books which study childhood, madness, psychiatric institution and poverty: 'El Nino, su Sufrimiento y la Pobreza' (San Juan, 1992); 'Del Espejo al Otro' (San Juan, 1998); and 'La Locura como Pasion' (San Juan, 1999). She has recently published on femininity with a special focus on ageing and menopause: 'The Long and Tortuous Path to Femininity' (Istanbul, 2014). Frances Thomson Salo trained with the British Society as a child and adult psychoanalyst, is a Training analyst and past President of the Australian Psychoanalytical Society, Chair of the International Psychoanalytical Association Committee of Women in Psychoanalysis, an editorial board member of the 'International Journal of Psychoanalysis', a consultant infant mental health clinician at the Royal Women's Hospital and child psychotherapist at the Royal Children's Hospital, an Honorary Fellow of the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, an Associate Professor on the faculty of the University of Melbourne Graduate Diploma for Infant and Parent Mental Health, and has published on child and infant-parent psychotherapy.

'Homosexualities challenges us right from its title, which brings together terms such as psychogenesis, a controversial notion, polymorphism, which speaks of diversity, and countertransference, a reference to our clinical practice. This successful interplay of ideas results in insightful and deep theoretical chapters that discuss varying conceptions of gender, the difference between sensuality and sexuality, and the interrelation of sameness and otherness, amongst others. The clinical chapters, in turn, show us the various ways in which present-day analysts work with patients who put into question our understanding of sexuality and gender more than a hundred years after the birth of psychoanalysis, when Victorian ideals were so influential. Homosexualities is a must-read for all those interested in the question of gender and sexuality today.'- Virginia Ungar, MD, Training Analyst of the Buenos Aires Psychoanalytic Association'This book is brilliant, exciting, and very accessible; this is a rare combination of articles and discussions from well-known psychoanalysts from all over the world. They share their complex views on homosexuality, dealing in depth with psychoanalytic theory. Very interesting cases of male and female patients are presented in this volume, showing that there is no typical development of homosexuality. They demonstrate that in each of them, the object choice can only be grasped by examining its psychogenesis, that is the psychic history of the subject and its vicissitudes.'- Christine Anzieu-Premmereur, MD, PhD, Director of the Columbia Psychoanalytic Center's Parent-Infant Program; Assistant Clinical Professor in Psychiatry at Columbia University; member of the New York Psychoanalytic Institute'This is an inspiring book. The authors, an international group of eminent psychoanalysts, examine the issue of the psychic construction of sexuality in a multiplicity of ways and offer new and profound contributions. All human societies are faced with the task of constructing two basic categories, the identical and the different. The psychic construction of sexuality by definition implies a complex relationship between both sexes. The word "homos", which means "the same" (sex), leaves an essential element out: the unconscious presence of the "other" sex. With the sophisticated theoretical discussions and the clinical examples offered, this book will constitute required reading for psychoanalysts and students of psychoanalysis, as well as for academics in the area of gender studies.'- Rosine Jozef Perelberg, Training Analyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society and Visiting Professor at University College London'In its great diversity, homosexual love is explored in this new edited book. With the emergence of new themes, it constitues an original and essential work that facilitates the psychoanalytic approach to our patients. This assembly of psychoanalysts from many countries gives the book a broad range and allows it to display not only the most classical Freudian theories but also innovative contemporary points of view.'- Georges Pragier, Training Analyst of the Paris Parisian Psychoanalytic Society and co-author of Repenser la Psychanalyse avec les sciences

• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS SERIES EDITOR'S FOREWORD INTRODUCTION by Elda Abrevaya CHAPTER ONE Gender as heritage of the first qualitative differentiation - Paul DenisCHAPTER TWO Male homosexuality in analytic treatment - Jacques AndreCHAPTER THREE Discussion of "Male homosexuality in analytic treatment", by Jacques Andre - Giovanna AmbrosioCHAPTER FOUR The two analyses of a gay man: the interplay of social change and psychoanalytic understanding - Ralph RoughtonCHAPTER FIVE The same and the other: homosexuality in adolescence - Monique CournutCHAPTER SIX Discussion of "The same and the other: homosexuality n adolescence", by Monique Cournut - Juan-Eduardo TesoneCHAPTER SEVEN The obscure object of desire - Ferhan OzenenCHAPTER EIGHT Inside Sisyphus's nightmare: destructive narcissism and death instinct - Raquel Cavaleiro FerreiraCHAPTER NINE Discussion of "Inside Sisyphus's nightmare: destructive narcissism and death instinct", by Raquel Cavaleiro Ferreira - Martina BurdetCHAPTER TEN Homosexuality and the parental figures - Ester Palerm Mari and Teresa FloresCHAPTER ELEVEN The two faces of the medallion - Ayse KurtulCHAPTER TWELVE Discussion of "The two faces of the medallion", by Ayse Kurtul - Ingrid Moeslein-TeisingCHAPTER THIRTEEN A woman looking for a woman - F. Gover Kazanciog?lu and Elda AbrevayaSUMMARY The clinical chapters: some concluding thoughts - Elda AbrevayaAFTERWORD - Frances Thomson-SaloINDEX