A Scientific Meeting presented by Deborah Luepnitz, Ph.D. A common misconception about treatments derived from psychoanalysis is that they are appropriate only for highly educated people of means. This presentation challenges that assumption by referring both to Freud’s free clinics and to Winnicott’s work with homeless children. We will proceed to a discussion of IFA (Insight For All)– a group in Philadelphia that connects analytically trained clinicians with individuals who are, or have been, street homeless.
A relational framework leaning on Winnicott’s concepts will be used while making room for relevant insights from the French tradition. There will be one case history of the 10-year treatment of a man who had nearly ruined his health on the street, and who made good use of the talking cure. Caring for marginalized people can have the positive effect of unsettling psychoanalytic theories and expanding them for our time.
