Survivor!

kenneth.mackendrick at utoronto.ca kenneth.mackendrick at utoronto.ca
Thu Nov 2 09:59:07 PST 2000


On Thu, 2 Nov 2000 09:11:38 -0800 (PST) Miles Jackson <cqmv at pdx.edu> wrote:


> I still don't get how reducing a complex social process (e.g., the status of
women in our society) to a result of individual psychological processes serves any useful purpose.

The very founding gesture and insight of psychoanalysis is that the notion of the individual is a myth.


> The only thing this psychological analysis does is turn our attention away
from the concrete social relations that produce the inequalities that women face in our society.

I would argue that psychoanalysis looks almost exclusively at the concrete social relations that produce the inequalities that women face in our society. I should differentiate the psychobabble I'm interested in from the conformist "therapy" so predominant today. One is social theoretical, the other mindless and insipid but a near present help for individuals that are in desparate need of a quick fix. I would make the case for psychoanalytic criticism, not clinical consolation.


> Without the social mechanisms to produce inequality, inequality could not
exist, regardless of psychological processes.

And I think it profoundly negligent to assume that social mechanisms are not reproduced by often compliant and sometimes unreflective fantasies. I don't see how GW Bush could rise to such popularity if not through some sort of collective psychosis.

ken



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list