Steps towards an embodied psychoanalysis and psychotherapy 2023: “Foreign Bodies: From Interpretation to Translation” and “Hearing, Feeling, Sensing: How do Somatic Countertransference Reactions Enter into the Field of Meaning Making”
Presents
Steps toward an embodied psychoanalysis and psychotherapy
Saturday, February 4, 2023
10:00 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. Eastern
IN-PERSON in New York, with breakfast served
Starr Foundation Hall
University Center, UL102
63 Fifth Avenue
Tickets available HERE
General Admission: $50
Students: $25
NSSR & NYU Postdoc students: Free (email NSSRFerencziCenter@gmail.com with your student N# to reserve a spot; limited number of seats available)
CE Credits (5 hours) available for
New York Psychologists, Social Workers, and MHCs
APA CE credits available for Psychologists
For students and practitioners of all levels
Presenters:
Jon Sletvold, Psy.D.
Doris Brothers, Ph.D.
Zeynep Catay, Ph.D.
Moderators/Discussants:
Adrienne Harris, Ph.D.
Miriam Steele, Ph.D.
Foreign Bodies: From Interpretation to Translation
Doris Brothers, Ph.D. & Jon Sletvold, Psy.D.
Try as we may to bring our language as close as possible to our own and our patients’ lived experience and much as we are able to gain some sense of what another person is feeling through imitation—both automatic and deliberate–we believe that it is impossible to precisely capture and describe what is experienced. In light of this humbling awareness, we have come to believe that something like a translational process may be necessary. However, what we have in mind differs from the form of translation that is common among traditional analysts—interpretation. While interpretation refers to verbal communications by analysts to patients that usually center around patients’ unconscious conflicts, it is counter to our vision of the embodied nature of the psychoanalytic process. For us, understanding emerges out of the intermignling I-you-we-world flow that connects patients and analysts.
In this workshop we demonstrate how we envision a translational process by turning to recent developments in the field of translation theory that show how the psychoanalytic encounter may be conceived as encounters with foreignness.
An illustrative clinical example is presented.
Hearing, Feeling, Sensing:
How do Somatic Countertransference Reactions
Enter into the Field of Meaning Making
Zeynep Catay, Ph.D.
This presentation will focus on findings from a qualitative study that investigated how psychotherapists and analysts become aware of, react to and make sense of their somatic countertransference reactions in sessions based on data from interviews and diaries kept by psychotherapists. The analysis of this data provides rich insight into the opportunities and difficulties inherent in the process. When attended to, bodily sensations could lead to powerful ‘moments of meeting’ where the patient could feel known and felt. However, expanding one’s clinical attention to the domain of the body also created much anxiety with its inherent intimacy and required an expanded capacity to tolerate ambiguity.
Program
Introduction by Adrienne Harris & Miriam Steele
Opening Exercise
Talk by Doris Brothers and Jon Sletvold followed by Q & A
Talk by Zeynep Catay followed by Q & A
Lunch
Discussion among presenters and participants
Embodied Supervision focusing on encounters between foreign bodies
Closing Discussion
Learning Objectives
At the end of the workshop, participants will be able to:
1. Discuss the differences and similarities between interpretation and what is seen an embodied translation
2. Explain how seeing the analytic encounter as encounters between foreign bodies changes the therapeutic relationship.
3. Define what somatic countertransference is and the different ways it can be processed in psychodynamic psychotherapy sessions.
4. Identify factors that facilitate or impede making use of somatic countertransference.
Jon Sletvold, Psy.D. is faculty, training and supervising analyst at the Norwegian Character Analytic Institute. He teaches embodied perspectives on psychoanalysis and psychotherapy in Europa, USA and China. He has written articles and book chapters on embodiment in psychoanalytic theory, practice and training. He is the author of The Embodied Analyst: From Freud and Reich to Relationality, Relational Perspectives Book Series, 2014, winner of the Gradiva Award, 2015
Doris Brothers, Ph.D. is a co-founder and faculty member of the Training and Research in Intersubjective Self Psychology Foundation (TRISP). She co-edited Psychoanalysis, Self and Context with Roger Frie from 2015 to 2019. She serves on the advisory board and council of IAPSP. She is the author of three books and many journal articles. Her latest book, Toward a Psychology of Uncertainty: Trauma-Centered Psychoanalysis was published by Analytic Press in 2008. She has presented workshops on embodiment with Jon Sletvold in New York, Beijing, Shanghai, Dublin and Vienna. She is in private practice in Manhattan, New York, USA.
Zeynep Catay, Ph.D. is a Clinical Psychologist and Dance/Movement Therapist in private practice in New York City. She was a faculty member at the Psychology Department of Istanbul Bilgi University between the years of 2005 and 2019. She is currently a part-time instructor and clinical supervisor at the Clinical Psychology Ph.D. program at the New School for Social Research. In addition, she is a visiting scholar at the Center for Attachment Research where she is currently directing a study on therapist’s ability to coordinate her nonverbal communication in child psychotherapy. Her current research and writing interests focus on nonverbal bodily dynamics and embodiment in psychotherapy. She is also a candidate at the NYU post-doctoral program for psychoanalysis.
Miriam Steele, Ph.D. is Professor of Psychology, at the New School for Social Research where she co-directs (with Dr. H. Steele) the Center for Attachment Research. Dr. Miriam Steele is also an Anna Freud Center trained psychoanalyst. Miriam initiated the London Parent-Child Project, a major longitudinal study of intergenerational patterns of attachment whose outcomes included the development of the Reflective Functioning concept and manual. Dr. M. Steele has also carried out longitudinal attachment research in the context of child maltreatment and adoption. Miriam, with Anne Murphy and Howard Steele, has pioneered the development and delivery of the Group Attachment-Based Intervention (GABI) aimed at preventing child maltreatment, and promoting secure child-parent attachments. Dr. Steele is among the 2017 Bowlby-Ainsworth Awardees so recognized by the Center for Mental Health Promotion. She is co-editor of the 2008 book, Clinical Applications of the Adult Attachment Interview, and the 2018 Handbook of Attachment-Based Interventions, both published by the Guilford Press, New York. Dr. Steele is a member of the Adult Attachment Interview Trainers’ Consortium.
Adrienne Harris, Ph.D. is Faculty and Supervisor at New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis. She is on the faculty and is a supervisor at the Psychoanalytic Institute of Northern California. She is an Editor at Psychoanalytic Dialogues, and Studies In Gender and Sexuality. In 2009, she, Lewis Aron, and Jeremy Safran established the Sándor Ferenczi Center at the New School University. She, Eyal Rozmarin and Steven Kuchuck co-edit the Book Series Relational Perspectives in Psychoanalysis. She is an editor of the IPA ejournal psychoanalysis.today.
Participants who wish to receive CE credits must attend the event in its entirety; attendance will be recorded to track each participant’s entry and exit time.
Participants with physical or sensory disabilities are encouraged to contact the CE committee members at least 2 weeks in advance of the event to plan for appropriate accommodations. Please contact us via phone or email:
Nichelle Horlacher (Department Secretary) T 212.229.5727 x3223
SteeleM@newschool.edu (Miriam Steele, Ph.D.)
LittL@newschool.edu (Lisa Litt, Ph.D.)
NSSRFerencziCenter@gmail.com (CJ Healy, Student Coordinator for the Sándor Ferenczi Center)
Participants may also contact CE committee members with any concerns. You may also share concerns when you receive your evaluation form after the event.
Tickets may be refunded up to 24 hours prior to the start of the event. Please email NSSRFerencziCenter@gmail.com to cancel your ticket and request a refund.
The New School for Social Research, Department of Psychology SW CPE is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Social Work as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed social workers #0199.
The New School for Social Research, Department of Psychology is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed mental health counselors. #MHC-0120.
The New School of Social Research, Department of Psychology is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Psychology as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed psychologists #PSY-0146.
The New School for Social Research, Department of Psychology is approved by the American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists.
The New School for Social Research Clinical Psychology Department maintains responsibility for this program and its content.
The Sponsors of this event report no conflicts of interest or commercial support.