Premium
Racism and Similarity: Paranoid‐Schizoid Structures
Author(s) -
Tan Richard
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
british journal of psychotherapy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.442
H-Index - 17
eISSN - 1752-0118
pISSN - 0265-9883
DOI - 10.1111/j.1752-0118.1993.tb00627.x
Subject(s) - psychology , racism , feeling , unconscious mind , similarity (geometry) , context (archaeology) , social psychology , psychoanalysis , psychotherapist , sociology , gender studies , paleontology , artificial intelligence , computer science , image (mathematics) , biology
SUMMARY. This paper attempts to examine the importance of exploring and interpreting in the transference the unconscious dynamics of racism as present in psychotherapeutic work; in particular, the primitive defences employed against the unfolding of racist feelings when therapist and patient are from different racial groupings. In this specific context, unless these feelings can be brought into light via transference interpretations, the therapist/patient relationship becomes stuck and very little growth can take place.