From the Collective to the Individual: Examining the Transference Relationship and Representations of the Inner World in the Therapy Room in the Context of Social Events
This article presents brief examples of how social events in Turkey and around the world enter the therapy room through patients’ associations, and examines them through the lens of transference and representations of the inner world. Freud’s discovery of psychoanalysis coincided with the eve of World War I. We can define the period of World War I as a time when Freud’s theory matured considerably (Quinodoz, 2004). Faced with the destruction and losses brought about by World War I, Freud produced his work Mourning and Melancholia. After World War I, starting in 1920, Freud put the ideas he had developed in the shadow of the war into writing. The death drive is a concept that was contemplated and added to the theory during this period. The effects of the external world are clearly observable in Freud’s own theory. The cases cannot be considered outside the cultural and political framework of that period. It is clear from Freud’s writings that each of them brought their psyches to the session room with characteristics specific to the period they lived in.
Today, major social events, influenced by social media and globalization, are reaching patients’ associations more quickly and occupying an important place in session rooms. These references to the outside world offer important insights into the patient’s inner world and the transference-countertransference relationship. This article will briefly discuss patient associations related to major social events in Turkey and around the world, exploring what the collective narrative might mean on an individual level and examining it within the framework of relevant theorists.
Canan DİKMEN is a clinical psychologist and a candidate in psychoanalytical training at Psike Istanbul; she is also an IPSO member. She is the series editor of the books, Introduction to the Work of Melanie Klein and Listening to Hanna Segal for Psike Istanbul Psychoanalysis Library.