The Internal World in the Shadow of Social History: Notes on Conscience, Superego, and Moral Masochism
This presentation will discuss some of the social processes we have witnessed in recent times within the context of the concepts of conscience, guilt, and moral masochism. Furthermore the internalization of the social potency and force by the infant and the individual in the form of “persuasion” will be explored. The transgenerational aspects of some social dynamics will be examined in relation to some emerging phenomena today. The development and institutionalization of psychoanalysis in this land will also be considered within the context of the mentioned social dynamics. Beyond attempting to encompass these lines within their specific scope, the referred social processes will be argued within the fundamental metapsychological context of the concepts of conscience and responsibility.
İlker ÖZYILDIRIM is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who is a member of the Istanbul Psychoanalysis Association. His articles on metapsychological arguments that are addressing the issues related with society, trauma, and history in the context of psychoanalysis have been published in various books and journals. He won the “Original Work Achievement Award for Psychoanalytic Writings” twice; first in 2016 by the book titled as Thinking about Gezi with Psychoanalysis, of which he was one of the authors, and then also in 2017 by the article titled “Notes on Psychoanalytic Work in Contact with Individual and Social Trauma”, which he co-authored. The TIHV Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Program, which he co-founded and coordinated along with a group of clinicians within the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (TIHV Istanbul), was awarded with the Community Award in Humanitarian Organizations by the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA) in 2019. His article, “To Brush History Against the Grain: An Essay on Unconscious Ownership of Guilt and Identifications” (2019) received the IPA Elise M. Hayman Award for the Study of the Holocaust and Genocide in 2023. His book, Meeting at the Border: Psychoanalytic Essays on History, Society, and Law, is published in 2023. He continues to reflect and work on re-reading the metapsychological implications of Freud’s texts and exploring their potential. He is a member of the Editorial Board of Psychoanalytic Essays.