COMMUNITY MENTAL HEALTH READING GROUP
What we understand as clinical work is built and perceived within context. Race in the United States has traditionally been viewed in a White-Black binary, but identities are much more nuanced. Psychoanalysis is also historically built with white experience as the status quo. Any individual that falls outside of these narrow definitions may not find themselves reflected, therapists and patients alike. Awareness of differences in race, culture, and political views among other aspects will inevitably impact our understanding of others, of the self, and of the in-betweens. Through a review of an interview with Lara Sheehi, PsyD, and an article by Leilani Salvo Crane, PsyD, this reading group aims to stimulate thoughts and reflections surrounding clinicians' and patients' identities, perceived or otherwise, and desires and challenges in finding mutuality. It is crucial to begin conversations to decenter whiteness, in which individuals within the consultation rooms are not assumed to be white as well as examining racism and other oppressions among BIPOC clinicians and patients, especially in a community mental health setting in which multiple intersectionality of identities and disenfranchisement are often witnessed and felt.
NCSPP is aware that historically psychoanalysis has either excluded or pathologized groups outside of the dominant population in terms of age, race, ethnicity, nationality, language, gender, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, disability, and size. As an organization, we are committed to bringing awareness to matters of anti-oppression, inequity, inequality, diversity, and inclusion as they pertain to our educational offerings, our theoretical orientation, our community, and the broader world we all inhabit.
Presenters Response:
This reading group serves to explore the spaces of identity that are not normally discussed in general discourse. By viewing and reading materials regarding diverse experiences, members will engage in social location exercises and talk about relevant themes in their work towards finding intersection in the clinical room.
This reading group is open to clinicians working in community mental health settings in non-profit and government-funded agencies.
For program related questions contact Geetali Chitre, Psy.D. at gpchitre@gmail.com.
Community Mental Health Committee
This committee is a group of clinicians who are interested in the relationship between Community Mental Health (CMH) and psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis is anchored in a quality of close care and attention that is often systematically denied to members of disadvantaged communities and difficult to locate in stressed, under-resourced public mental health clinics. CMH clinicians hold the tension between a variety of institutional, social, and political pressures and constraints. Meanwhile, psychoanalytic thinking sometimes misses the significance of these systemic influences on individual lives.
There is important work to be done in bridging the theoretical and concrete gaps between community work and psychoanalytic practice. The CMH committee aspires to create a more inclusive home for CMH clinicians within the NCSPP community. In turn, we advocate for greater investment from psychoanalysis in the projects of CMH practitioners- in terms of both theory and practical engagement.
We seek to identify the needs and interests of our various partners both in CMH and NCSPP. We invite our community members to engage with us by emailing us at cmh@ncspp.org .