The Psychoanalyst in the Community Section

The DPE Psychoanalyst in the Community Section aims to increase recognition and support within our institutes, centers, societies, and APsA of the multiple ways our members bring their psychoanalytic knowledge and skill to bear in various community settings and organizations. We foster open dialogue and active questioning about how our work in the community is an integral part of psychoanalytic theory and practice and how we integrate our work in the community into our individual and collective evolving psychoanalytic identities.

Paula Christian-Kliger PhD, ABPP, Co-chair
Neil Altman PhD, Co-chair

Our interactions with community members dispel negative stereotypes and enhance awareness of what psychoanalytic/psychodynamic practitioners and perspectives have to offer outside of the consulting room. In reciprocal fashion we learn a great deal from our community partners, and we capture and incorporate that learning into seminars, programs, and other educational activities in our institutes, centers, societies, and APsA.

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Section Chair/Co-Chairs Contact information.

Name: Paula Christian-Kliger PhD
Email: docpck@gmail.com

Name: Neil Altman PhD
Email: altman.neil@gmail.com

Activities of the Section

The DPE Psychoanalyst in the Community Section aims to increase recognition and support
within our institutes, centers, societies, and APsaA of the multiple ways our members bring their
psychoanalytic knowledge and skill to bear in various community settings and organizations. We
foster open dialogue and active questioning about how our work in the community is an integral
part of psychoanalytic theory and practice and how we integrate our work in the community
into our individual and collective evolving psychoanalytic identities.

Mission

Psychoanalysts and psychodynamic psychotherapists frequently work in or consult to various organizations in the community. For many community members, these face-to-face interactions enhance awareness of what psychoanalytic/psychodynamic practitioners and perspectives have to offer outside of the consulting room, dispel negative stereotypes, and help create an ecology in which psychoanalysis can survive and flourish. The goals of this Section are to:

Increase recognition and support within our institutes, societies, and our national organization of the various ways our members are applying their psychoanalytic knowledge and skill in the community and of the value of their activities;
Capture the rich learning resulting from those activities; incorporate that learning into seminars, programs, and other educational activities in our institutes, societies, and APsaA;
Foster open dialogue and active questioning within APsaA about the roles of the psychoanalyst in the community; integrate those roles into our individual and collective psychoanalytic identities.

Vision

We hope to facilitate a cultural shift in which psychoanalysis in the community is more fully integrated into the discourse of psychoanalysis as a whole, contributing to the enrichment of both.

Description of Resources that we hope to make available on the website

In our work we recognize the importance of interdisciplinary perspectives with particular
reference to group relations, systems theory, and field theory. Because of the powerful
transferences and countertransferences that are activated in community psychoanalysis, we
also stress the need for ongoing self-analysis/self-study and for shared reflective spaces in which
powerful affects can be experienced and contained.
Our interactions with community members dispel negative stereotypes and enhance awareness
of what psychoanalytic/psychodynamic practitioners and perspectives have to offer outside of
the consulting room. In reciprocal fashion we learn a great deal from our community partners,
and we capture and incorporate that learning into seminars, programs, and other educational
activities in our institutes, centers, societies, and APsaA.
We actively collaborate with institutes to develop the interdisciplinary model of “Bridging
Psychoanalysis and the Community.” This model begins with community psychoanalysis
discussion groups that bring members of the psychoanalytic community, including candidates,
faculty, and community-based clinicians together to study and learn with and from each other.
This leads up to an 8-session course in which members of the analytic community and clinicians
from community-based organizations serve together as co-instructors and co-facilitators.
We offer the Candidate in the Community Mentorship Award. Candidates who are engaged in
various community settings and organizations receive a stipend of $750 to recognize and
support their work in the community. Candidates are paired with senior analysts/mentors who
help them deepen their understanding and practice of community psychoanalysis. We are
collaborating with the IPA Off the Couch podcasts to develop a course on community
psychoanalysis.

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