James Baldwin was a great mind, a feeling man, and a profound social critic. Baldwin was also critical of psychoanalysis. He warned that psychoanalysis could be used to normalize, reinvent, and reinvest in the status quo. He noted the potential for those with power and privilege to use psychoanalysis as a means of narcissism, avoidance, denial, and escape from accountability.

 

I find his critique and skepticism of psychoanalysis compelling, important, and interesting. For when I hear and read Baldwin's words, it strikes me that he too was engaged in a profoundly deep social psychoanalysis of America and its people. His incredible ability to listen carefully, to look beyond surface, to feel as a way of knowing, and to think and speak clearly about murky, hidden, or disavowed terrain seems quite close to the psychoanalytic endeavor.  

 

In March, Dr. Jamieson Webster, a spirited and esteemed psychoanalyst from New York, will be in discussion with the Bay Area's own Dr. Israel Katz for a special workshop entitled "Thinking about the Body: Conversion Disorder," which will be held at the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis. This is a unique opportunity to think with Dr. Webster who will only be in town for a short visit. As seen in the NCSPP brochure:

 

 

Considering conversion disorder from a more gender-neutral perspective, it carries within itself the failure of medical diagnosis and the mapping of many bodily issues that seem to follow the fault lines of culture. In this event, we will look back at Freud's original use of the term and its implications in clinical issues today.