Encountering Silencing

Prof. Dr. Michael B. Buchholz studied psychology and social sciences, fully trained as a psychoanalyst, training analyst in Göttingen (Germany), taught social psychology at International Psychoanalytic University (IPU) in Berlin until retirement in autumn 2020. His main interests are to combine psychoanalysis and the study of psychotherapeutic conversation, thus the application of conversation analysis as a method of microscopic observation applicable in social situations, including of violence. He has published more than 25 books and more than 300 papers on family therapy, treatment technique, supervision, conversation analysis, and violence.Aleksandar Dimitrijević, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst. He works as a lecturer at the International Psychoanalytic University and in private practice in Berlin. He has given lectures, seminars, university courses, and conference presentations throughout Europe and in the US. He is the author of many conceptual and empirical papers about attachment theory and research, psychoanalytic education, and psychoanalysis and the arts, some of which were translated into German, Hungarian, Italian, Slovenian, Spanish, and Turkish. He has also edited or co-edited eleven books or special journal issues, the most recent of which are Ferenczi’s Influence on Contemporary Psychoanalytic Traditions (with Gabriele Cassullo and Jay Frankel, 2018) and Silence and Silencing in Psychoanalysis (with Michael B. Buchholz, 2020).

‘Following their brilliant book From the Abyss of Loneliness: to the Bliss of Solitude, in which they teased out the silence in which loneliness tends to germinate, the writers and co-editors Buchholz and Dimitrijevic turn their magnifying glass and sound amplifiers into the eye of the storm and encounter silencing. Gathering an impressive list of contributors in their new co-edited book, Encountering Silencing, they examine meticulously the intricacies of active silencing of victims, perpetrators, and witnesses – the triad of participants in traumatic events – spreading from self-silencing to the denial and disavowal in socio-political groups and institutions of the truth about traumatic experiences. They do not shy away from facing the long tradition of silencing creative voices in the history of psychoanalysis as well. In this book, with the help of their contributors, Buchholz and Dimitrijevic recognize that silencing is a human form of communication, inspired by the malignant consequence of power. They emphasize that it is the act of silencing and not the trauma per se that leads to emotional suffering and mental pain. This book does more than paint the roadmap of the processes and mechanisms involved in silencing and its consequences so we can recognize them as clinicians. It is also an invitation for all of us to sharpen our skills and expertise and nurture the courage that is needed in the important battle against acts of silencing. At the end of this book, I was left with the sensation that there is already another book in the making by this duo, a book about power that I'm already eager to read.’

• AcknowledgementsAbout the editors and contributorsIntroduction: silencing the traumatised and hearing silencingAleksandar Dimitrijević and Michael B. Buchholz1. Silencing victims, witnesses, and perpetratorsMichael B. Buchholz, Aleksandar Dimitrijević, and Hans-Christoph Ramm2. “But break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue”: examples of self-silencing in classical and contemporary literatureAleksandar Dimitrijević and Michael B. Buchholz3. Traumatic disclosures and failures of listeningStephen Frosh4. Racial massacres and silencing in the Deep SouthRoger Frie5. Silencing of female voices in medical history: the silenced girl who cried painBabette S. Gekeler6. Silencing the voices of heretics and other religionsUta Blohm, Aleksandar Dimitrijević, and Michael B. Buchholz7. Silence in the classroom: suppressing (gifted) students’ curiosity and creativity Ana Altaras Dimitrijević8. Censorship and silencing artistic creativityAleksandar Dimitrijević9. Silencing creative voices in the history of psychoanalysis Aleksandar Dimitrijević10. Examples of silencing in the psychotherapy office Aleksandar Dimitrijević11. Dream-telling in family therapy sessions: how they can change silencing into hearablesMichael B. Buchholz12. First-person narratives of madness: the revenge of the silencedGail A. HornsteinIndex