CL 623: CLINICAL PROCESS AND TECHNIQUE
Spring, 2010
Allan Scholom, Ph.D.
30 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 1914
Chicago, IL 60602
312-641-1140
ascholom@ccpsa.org
Course Description
The course will be organized around making more alive our understanding of what we mean by unconscious life and how it is expressed. We will explore this primarily in the psychotherapeutic context but will include how unconscious phenomena present in other realms, as in our personal and professional lives. Toward this end, we will work closely with clinical material as the foundation out of which we will integrate our discussion of various psychoanalytic approaches including dreams, free association, and transference and countertransference. While the major psychoanalytic theories all have something vitally important to say about the human condition, not one by itself or taken together is able to encompass all of how we develop and how we change. In this spirit we will work toward developing further our own synthesis and point of view using psychoanalysis as a method to do so.
Goals
- To deepen our understanding of unconscious life and how it is expressed.
- To enhance our capacity to use psychoanalytic approaches in clinical, personal and professional contexts.
- To become more cognizant of the ways in which we work in the therapeutic context
- To develop a more coherent sense as to how we think people change.
Requirements and Evaluation
As in the psychoanalytic way of engaging with clinical work, students will present in class an experience with a therapy case or something personal or professional that felt especially meaningful. This will enable us to clarify where and how psychoanalytic methods and concepts enhance our understanding. In orienting yourself to the presentation do muse over what unconscious meanings and motivations may be at play in moving you toward your choice of what to talk about.
Written work will involve two, three to four page (double spaced) papers. The first is due at the mid point of the class and ought to address some reflection on what you have come to think about the clinical/change process in the broadest sense, including your studies in the program and in your lives moreover. The second paper is due the last class and will involve writing about a meaningful clinical experience, incorporating what you came to see via class discussions and readings and what questions still remain. In both papers do keep in mind that the psychoanalytic approach involves critique so include what you do not like as well.
Grades will be based both on class participation and written work with the tiebreaker going in the direction of the former. We will clarify and elaborate on all of this when we meet.
Attendance is expected except in emergencies and/or prearranged with the instructor.
Outline and Schedule
Session 1. Orientation to the Course: Introducing Ourselves and the Others We Will Be Reading
Pine, F. (1990). Drive, Ego, Object, & Self: A Synthesis for Clinical Work. (pp. ix-x, 1-21). USA: Basic Books.
Hedges, L.E. (2003). Listening Perspectives in Psychotherapy-20th Anniversary Edition. (pp. xvii-xviii, xxi-xxxi). Northvale, N.J.: Jason Aronson.
Session 2. The Four Psychologies and Listening Perspectives
Pine, F. (pp. 98-116)
Hedges, L.E. (pp. 1-25)
Sessions 3-7. Presentations and Elaborations
Readings will be assigned in relation to the presentations. These will include additional chapters from the texts as well as other material as relevant (such as on dreams and ‘neutrality’).
Session 8. Where We Are with Our Own Synthesis and Point of View
Pine, F. (pp. 257-260)
Hedges, L.E. (pp. 303-308).