24 Weeks | November 17, 2023 – May 24, 2024
Fridays | 10:00 am – 12:00 pm

GENERATIONS OF LONGING AND BELONGING: 
An Analysis of the Generational Experiences Amongst Immigrants
Maria Pilar Bratko, Ph.D., MFT 
November 17; December 1, 8, 15; January 5, 12, 19, 26

In this course, we will discuss current literature that informs the psychological negotiations 1st generation, 1.5 generation, and 2nd generation immigrants make in the experience of longing and belonging as it relates to a dominant U.S. cultural/native (left-behind) context.

Clinically, this course will provide treatment considerations for those individuals who have this sense of longing and belonging as a result of their immigration status, whether 1st, 1.5, or 2nd generation. Related themes addressed include intergenerational transmission of trauma, unique developmental considerations, and systemic racism as it relates to the immigrant experience. Symptom presentation, transference and countertransference, and language use in treatment (when language of origin is not used), will also be explored.

OTHERNESS AND THE COLLECTIVE EXPERIENCE:
Disruption and the Problem of Belonging among Immigrants
Carolina Bacchi, Psy.D.
February 2, 9, 16, 23; March 1, 8, 15, 22

This course reflects on unconscious intergenerational messages inherent in relations between individuals and collectives as we visit clinical encounters of immigrant analytic pairs. We will consider the displaced social signification and trauma while exploring immigrants’ inner emotional experience and its manifestations in the clinical process. We will also reflect on belonging and not belonging as manifested in the context of foreignness. Through readings and case material, we will deepen our understanding of the work with foreigners in clinical practice while also considering the specificities of social othering and the unconscious intergenerational messages inherent in relations between individuals and collectives.

ON NOT SITTING STILL:
Otherness as Dimension of Neurodivergent and Neuroqueer Experience
Ben Morsa, Psy.D.
March 29; April 5, 12, 19; May 3, 10, 17, 24

This course will engage dimensions of otherness as they manifest in clinical theory and praxis with neurodivergent and neuroqueer patients. We will survey readings from British object relations, French psychoanalysis, community members, and activists that support our work to explore dead angles and underutilized affordances in analytic work with this population. Discussion of readings and related case material will facilitate curiosity into historical (and contemporary) assumptions about autism — in particular, those related to symbolic functioning, sociality, relationality, and somatic experience. We will also note the ways that neurodivergent and queer experience shed light on limited (and limiting) analytic assumptions of what it means to be fully human: to belong to the human experience. As time and interest allow, we will also discuss the process of psychological assessment and how analysts might make use of this intervention with neurodivergent patients.