Short Course: Psychodynamics: Psychoanalysis in a Melancholic Mode
Psychodynamics: Psychoanalysis in a Melancholic Mode
Daniel Polyak & Toni HellmannSessions:Saturdays, October 11-December 6 (skipping Saturday, Nov. 29)
12-2 pm EST, 9-10am PST
Meets online.
Course Description:
While psychodynamics is a foundational concept in psychoanalytic theory and practice, it is also a term that currently circulates in the mainstream as the opposite of behaviorism. In the contemporary landscape of American psychotherapy, where behaviorism is favored by hegemony, psychodynamics is used to reinforce a binary and becomes disoriented from its psychoanalytic meanings. This course addresses the question of whether psychodynamics has come to signify a melancholic mode of psychoanalysis in the Freudian sense of melancholia as a thwarted mourning process. Psychoanalysts may evade mourning the loss of cultural dominance by disavowing collective power; behaviorists may evade mourning the loss of psychoanalytic meaning in mental healthcare by disavowing the power of the unconscious. Tense areas in clinical practice where behaviorist/psychodynamic binaries undermine complex therapeutic work will be explored, including: money/fee, breakdown/analyzability, interiority/politics. And these questions will be considered: How has the changing landscape of American mental healthcare impacted the practice of psychoanalysis over time? How does psychodynamics, a term with such thick sequelae, thin out over time? How can psychoanalytic meanings be restored to psychodynamics?
Frame:
This course is for practitioners of the mind and body. The course material is psychoanalytic in method and scope, but open to all practitioners that consider the unconscious a meaningful guide for transformations of mind and body. We welcome psychoanalysts, social workers, mental health counselors, psychologists, psychiatrists, somatic and body practitioners, spiritual counselors, holistic healers, peer counselors, and anyone else that has substantial training and experience working with individuals and/or groups.
The course will meet for 8 weeks on Saturdays from 12:00-2:00 pm from October 11-December 6 (skipping Saturday, Nov. 29). The first hour of each class will focus on theory and history with close reading of text and the second hour will be for clinically oriented discussion of vignettes from participants’ practices.
If you are interested in the course, but are not sure if it is for you or want to know more, please email Daniel and/or Toni.
Readings will include Sigmund Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia, David Eng and Shinhee Han’s Racial Melancholia, Racial Dissociation, Dagmar Herzog’s Cold War Freud, Daniel Gaztimbide’s A Psychotherapy For The People, Janet Malcolm’s The Impossible Profession, Katie Schechter’s Illusions of a Future, Hans Loewald’s The Therapeutic Action of Psychoanalysis, Christopher Bollas’ Catch Them Before They Fall, and Danny Nobus’ Psychoanalytic Currencies: Money, Commensurability, and Clinical Economies from Freud to Lacan.
Daniel Polyak, MA, LP practices psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy with children, adolescents, adults, and parents in New York City. He completed psychoanalytic training at the Institute for Psychoanalytic Training and Research (IPTAR), and will begin supervising at the IPTAR Clinical Center in Fall 2025. He is a lecturer in the Women and Gender Studies program at Hunter College. His most recent publication appeared in Studies in Gender and Sexuality and is called "Cis Pathology: Psychoanalysis of Cisgender." He is currently working on two projects: the second volume of Penis Envy, an artist book zine, co-authored with Acacia Marable, and a co-authored piece on passing, envy, and beauty.
Toni Hellmann, LCSW practices psychoanalysis in Philadelphia and New York City. She completed psychoanalytic training at the William Alanson White Institute, where she co-founded the Study Group on Race and Psychoanalysis. She is a Supervisor of Psychotherapy at the William Alanson White Institute, a Case Consultant for the Manhattan Institute's One Year Program in Psychoanalysis and the Sociopolitical World, and an Associate Editor of the journal Contemporary Psychoanalysis.
Full fee: $600, Reduced fee: $300.
Or contact psychosocial.foundation@gmail.com for scholarship information.
Psychodynamics: Psychoanalysis in a Melancholic Mode
Daniel Polyak & Toni HellmannSessions:Saturdays, October 11-December 6 (skipping Saturday, Nov. 29)
12-2 pm EST, 9-10am PST
Meets online.
Course Description:
While psychodynamics is a foundational concept in psychoanalytic theory and practice, it is also a term that currently circulates in the mainstream as the opposite of behaviorism. In the contemporary landscape of American psychotherapy, where behaviorism is favored by hegemony, psychodynamics is used to reinforce a binary and becomes disoriented from its psychoanalytic meanings. This course addresses the question of whether psychodynamics has come to signify a melancholic mode of psychoanalysis in the Freudian sense of melancholia as a thwarted mourning process. Psychoanalysts may evade mourning the loss of cultural dominance by disavowing collective power; behaviorists may evade mourning the loss of psychoanalytic meaning in mental healthcare by disavowing the power of the unconscious. Tense areas in clinical practice where behaviorist/psychodynamic binaries undermine complex therapeutic work will be explored, including: money/fee, breakdown/analyzability, interiority/politics. And these questions will be considered: How has the changing landscape of American mental healthcare impacted the practice of psychoanalysis over time? How does psychodynamics, a term with such thick sequelae, thin out over time? How can psychoanalytic meanings be restored to psychodynamics?
Frame:
This course is for practitioners of the mind and body. The course material is psychoanalytic in method and scope, but open to all practitioners that consider the unconscious a meaningful guide for transformations of mind and body. We welcome psychoanalysts, social workers, mental health counselors, psychologists, psychiatrists, somatic and body practitioners, spiritual counselors, holistic healers, peer counselors, and anyone else that has substantial training and experience working with individuals and/or groups.
The course will meet for 8 weeks on Saturdays from 12:00-2:00 pm from October 11-December 6 (skipping Saturday, Nov. 29). The first hour of each class will focus on theory and history with close reading of text and the second hour will be for clinically oriented discussion of vignettes from participants’ practices.
If you are interested in the course, but are not sure if it is for you or want to know more, please email Daniel and/or Toni.
Readings will include Sigmund Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia, David Eng and Shinhee Han’s Racial Melancholia, Racial Dissociation, Dagmar Herzog’s Cold War Freud, Daniel Gaztimbide’s A Psychotherapy For The People, Janet Malcolm’s The Impossible Profession, Katie Schechter’s Illusions of a Future, Hans Loewald’s The Therapeutic Action of Psychoanalysis, Christopher Bollas’ Catch Them Before They Fall, and Danny Nobus’ Psychoanalytic Currencies: Money, Commensurability, and Clinical Economies from Freud to Lacan.
Daniel Polyak, MA, LP practices psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy with children, adolescents, adults, and parents in New York City. He completed psychoanalytic training at the Institute for Psychoanalytic Training and Research (IPTAR), and will begin supervising at the IPTAR Clinical Center in Fall 2025. He is a lecturer in the Women and Gender Studies program at Hunter College. His most recent publication appeared in Studies in Gender and Sexuality and is called "Cis Pathology: Psychoanalysis of Cisgender." He is currently working on two projects: the second volume of Penis Envy, an artist book zine, co-authored with Acacia Marable, and a co-authored piece on passing, envy, and beauty.
Toni Hellmann, LCSW practices psychoanalysis in Philadelphia and New York City. She completed psychoanalytic training at the William Alanson White Institute, where she co-founded the Study Group on Race and Psychoanalysis. She is a Supervisor of Psychotherapy at the William Alanson White Institute, a Case Consultant for the Manhattan Institute's One Year Program in Psychoanalysis and the Sociopolitical World, and an Associate Editor of the journal Contemporary Psychoanalysis.
Full fee: $600, Reduced fee: $300.
Or contact psychosocial.foundation@gmail.com for scholarship information.
Psychodynamics: Psychoanalysis in a Melancholic Mode
Daniel Polyak & Toni HellmannSessions:Saturdays, October 11-December 6 (skipping Saturday, Nov. 29)
12-2 pm EST, 9-10am PST
Meets online.
Course Description:
While psychodynamics is a foundational concept in psychoanalytic theory and practice, it is also a term that currently circulates in the mainstream as the opposite of behaviorism. In the contemporary landscape of American psychotherapy, where behaviorism is favored by hegemony, psychodynamics is used to reinforce a binary and becomes disoriented from its psychoanalytic meanings. This course addresses the question of whether psychodynamics has come to signify a melancholic mode of psychoanalysis in the Freudian sense of melancholia as a thwarted mourning process. Psychoanalysts may evade mourning the loss of cultural dominance by disavowing collective power; behaviorists may evade mourning the loss of psychoanalytic meaning in mental healthcare by disavowing the power of the unconscious. Tense areas in clinical practice where behaviorist/psychodynamic binaries undermine complex therapeutic work will be explored, including: money/fee, breakdown/analyzability, interiority/politics. And these questions will be considered: How has the changing landscape of American mental healthcare impacted the practice of psychoanalysis over time? How does psychodynamics, a term with such thick sequelae, thin out over time? How can psychoanalytic meanings be restored to psychodynamics?
Frame:
This course is for practitioners of the mind and body. The course material is psychoanalytic in method and scope, but open to all practitioners that consider the unconscious a meaningful guide for transformations of mind and body. We welcome psychoanalysts, social workers, mental health counselors, psychologists, psychiatrists, somatic and body practitioners, spiritual counselors, holistic healers, peer counselors, and anyone else that has substantial training and experience working with individuals and/or groups.
The course will meet for 8 weeks on Saturdays from 12:00-2:00 pm from October 11-December 6 (skipping Saturday, Nov. 29). The first hour of each class will focus on theory and history with close reading of text and the second hour will be for clinically oriented discussion of vignettes from participants’ practices.
If you are interested in the course, but are not sure if it is for you or want to know more, please email Daniel and/or Toni.
Readings will include Sigmund Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia, David Eng and Shinhee Han’s Racial Melancholia, Racial Dissociation, Dagmar Herzog’s Cold War Freud, Daniel Gaztimbide’s A Psychotherapy For The People, Janet Malcolm’s The Impossible Profession, Katie Schechter’s Illusions of a Future, Hans Loewald’s The Therapeutic Action of Psychoanalysis, Christopher Bollas’ Catch Them Before They Fall, and Danny Nobus’ Psychoanalytic Currencies: Money, Commensurability, and Clinical Economies from Freud to Lacan.
Daniel Polyak, MA, LP practices psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy with children, adolescents, adults, and parents in New York City. He completed psychoanalytic training at the Institute for Psychoanalytic Training and Research (IPTAR), and will begin supervising at the IPTAR Clinical Center in Fall 2025. He is a lecturer in the Women and Gender Studies program at Hunter College. His most recent publication appeared in Studies in Gender and Sexuality and is called "Cis Pathology: Psychoanalysis of Cisgender." He is currently working on two projects: the second volume of Penis Envy, an artist book zine, co-authored with Acacia Marable, and a co-authored piece on passing, envy, and beauty.
Toni Hellmann, LCSW practices psychoanalysis in Philadelphia and New York City. She completed psychoanalytic training at the William Alanson White Institute, where she co-founded the Study Group on Race and Psychoanalysis. She is a Supervisor of Psychotherapy at the William Alanson White Institute, a Case Consultant for the Manhattan Institute's One Year Program in Psychoanalysis and the Sociopolitical World, and an Associate Editor of the journal Contemporary Psychoanalysis.
Full fee: $600, Reduced fee: $300.
Or contact psychosocial.foundation@gmail.com for scholarship information.