Events

Morning Focus: Core Competencies in Relational Psychoanalysis Drawing from Dr. Roy Barsness’ text, Core Competencies in Relational Psychoanalysis: A Guide to Practice, Study, and Research, this session invites participants to identify and explore the seven core disciplines of relational psychoanalysis, as revealed through his qualitative research. The workshop will deepen participants' understanding of relationally oriented […]

If virtual, the discussion begins at 4pm CDT. Please use link to review all details. This film screening explores the pleasure and fascination we experience when consuming horror movies and true crime media. Presenters will draw from analytic philosophy and psychoanalytic theory to explain our attraction to what is frightening and uncertain in our world. […]

In person film screening begins at 2pm. The discussion begins at 4pm. This film screening explores the pleasure and fascination we experience when consuming horror movies and true crime media. Presenters will draw from analytic philosophy and psychoanalytic theory to explain our attraction to what is frightening and uncertain in our world. By identifying horror […]

David Scharff & Kate Scharff

Daniel Brockett, M.D. will explain the neuropsychopharmacology of classical psychedelics as well as atypical psychedelics such as ketamine and empathogens such as MDMA.

Alessandra Lemma

Presenter: Usha Tummala-Narra, Ph.D. | In this presentation, Dr. Tummala-Narra will explore how personality is shaped by sociocultural context, and how experiences of one’s sociocultural context rely on personality, family dynamics, and trauma.

Join us for an engaging opportunity to learn about NPI on Zoom! Meet the Dean and President for an introduction to the program, connect with current candidates, experience a live class in action, and participate in a Q&A session to explore all our program offerings.

Please join us for a series of conversations 1  Sessions remaining April 12, 2025 Presented by the Committee on Women and Psychoanalysis of the International Psychoanalytic Association (COWAP) North America, and sponsored by the Washington Center for Psychoanalysis. Organizing Committee: Chair: Margarita Cereijido, Co-chair: Catherine Mallouh, Members: Anne Adelman, Janice Lieberman, Jill Gentile and Jeri […]

"Work Discussion Group (WDG) for Catastrophic Situations" – Martha Harris Model, Tavistock Organized by the IPA PACE Committee & NCP. About the Work Discussion Group: The Work Discussion Group (WDG) provides a reflective space for professionals working in catastrophic situations across diverse contexts such as hospitals, schools, and community centers. Grounded in the Martha Harris […]

This course will focus on the idea that we can access our unconscious thoughts and images through art, specifically collage. There will be an introduction to “dreaming while awake” referencing both Bion and Thomas Ogden’s thoughts. Participants will be invited to create a collage that represents work with a patient. There will be time to […]

Hosted by the Erikson Institute for Education, Research, and Advocacy of the Austen Riggs Center Peer support serves a vital role in the mental health of college students. Beyond buttressing clinical services and expanding resources to meet unprecedented demand, it can mobilize students’ strengths and foster experiences of community and belonging. However, it also brings […]

Dr. Kite will present a paper, Strange Bedfellows: Sexual Boundary Violations and Ethics in Psychoanalysis, in which she will highlight the powerful role played by the analyst's unconscious functioning in all analytic work and especially in cases of sexual boundary violations. A question-and-answer period will follow the presentation.

An opportunity to study parenting issues in a variety of settings. This conference will explore current issues of diversity and social challenge as couples become parents and navigate unique parenting issues. Experts from the Tavistock Clinic and the faculty of the International Psychotherapy Institute will illuminate parenting issues through a unique object relations framework. Through […]

Anne Erreich, PhD, cites the prominence of theories which locate serious adult psychopathology in the pre-verbal infant’s inability to formulate or represent traumatic experience. The work of two such authors, H. Levine and D.B. Stern, is briefly considered. The frame of reference for this investigation is that clinical and academic research findings are highly relevant […]

Dr. Clara Mucci presents the three levels of interpersonal traumatizations with all the consequences at the level of attachment styles, interpersonal neurobiology, and affect regulation and personability dynamics up to the point of developing complex PTSD and personality disorders.

Led by Prof. Dr. med. Lutz Goetzmann. In this presentation, I will present?theoretically?the three stages of the Oedipus complex according to Freud and Lacan. A clinical discussion will follow this. With regard to the first phallic-imaginary stage, I will make references to Laplanche's seduction theory, particularly with regard to the attribution of gender identity. I […]

How infants and toddlers separate and individuate from their families has been formally studied largely from a Euro-American viewpoint. Separation-individuation occurs simultaneously, and intertwined with, the development of attachment patterns, but has received much less cross-cultural attention, a deficit this conference will attempt to address. Cultures are highly variable in how they influence early child […]

Unrepresented and yet-to-be-suffered trauma and neglect announce themselves in the language of symptoms, absence and emergent enactments in the treatment field. This course will address the challenges when working with patients whose trauma does not avail itself to symbolization and mentalization. These patients often suffer disturbances in the area of self- other definition, continuity and […]

Led by Prof. Dr. med. Lutz Goetzmann. Altruism itself is underexplored in psychoanalysis. The topic's importance for learners is its investigation into a peculiar form of altruism. Living kidney donors are unusual, extreme cases in which the acceptable costs to the benefactor far exceed an acceptable threshold for most people. There are many instances of […]

Dr. Karbelnig believes that psychoanalytic clinicians practice framing, presence, and engagement in their work with patients. They pursue the unconscious mind through focusing on transference and countertransference, repetitive psycho-behavioral themes, and dreams (and other signifiers of the unconscious).

Adjusting the Distance. Michael Feldman MB, BS,FRC,Psych; Kay Long PHD; Elizabeth Wilson MD

Presented by Neal Vorus, PhD

Daniel Shaw, LCSW. Understanding Traumatizing Narcissism and Its Clinical Utility.  Mr. Shaw presents a way of understanding the traumatic impact of narcissism as it is engendered developmentally and as it is enacted relationally. Here, he focuses on the "traumatizing narcissist's" need for control, describes the internal needs and developmental narrative of the traumatizing narcissist, the […]

We are all imbedded in the sociocultural context in which we exist. The personal subjectivities of both therapist and patient are deeply affected by the experiences within their particular sociocultural context. Race and culture make their way into the clinical dyad in myriad ways both big and small with big consequences. The necessary exploration of […]

In everyday language, "gender" is often used to signify whether one identifies as male, female, or something beyond these categories. For some, gender represents an expansive field of identity possibilities, shaped by an evolving sense of self. For others, it is synonymous with the biological reality of sex. As a verb, "to gender" signifies an […]

This conference will explore the dynamic between psyche and soma, using the theoretical frame of the Paris Psychosomatic School to enhance skills. Both adult and child clinical cases of patients suffering from somatic illness will be presented along with some specific mental organization that requires technical changes in the analytic intervention to improve strategies.

This applied psychoanalytic presentation by W. Scott Griffies, MD, explores the phenomenon of murder-suicide in post-Katrina New Orleans. This presentation utilizes an object relational framework to understand the multidetermined causes of the murder-suicide. It highlights how disasters can bring individuals together in desperate situations, destabilize social connections, and exacerbate avoidant defenses through increased substance abuse. […]

Presenter: M. Sagman Kayatekin, MD | Psychoanalytic discipline is in the process of broadening its theory, practitioners and applications. We welcome contributions from different psychoanalytic approaches and related disciplines in social sciences, humanities and neuro-psychoanalysis.

This series of 6 closed meetings offers pre-licensed and licensed therapists a safe and confidential place to get help with difficult cases, discuss professional challenges, and explore new ways to approach clients. The instructors will provide participants with tools to cultivate a foundational understanding of various psychoanalytic theories.

Anora (2024) is the fifth consecutive feature film from Sean Baker to focus on the lives of sex workers and similarly marginalized peoples. It tells the story of Anora, or “Ani”, a resilient and powerful young working class woman from the Russian immigrant community of Brighton Beach. The film is a riotous, heartbreaking, uplifting, laugh-out-loud […]

This event will be presented by Dr. Paula Christian Kliger, Dr. Kris Yi, Dr. Lynne Jacobs, and Dr. Holly Han. We are all imbedded in the sociocultural context in which we exist. The personal subjectivities of both therapist and patient are deeply affected by the experiences within their particular sociocultural context. Race and culture make […]

Michael Langlois

Todd Essig

Fred Busch, MD, speaks about Problem-Focused Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, a modified psychoanalytic treatment approach that addresses patient’s specific problems, including symptoms, personality issues, relationship struggles, and behavioral difficulties. The primary facets of this treatment approach will be described, including identification of problems and their associated triggers and feelings, and developing a psychodynamic formulation to aid therapists […]

Join us Saturday, May 10, 2025 for Thinking Together Without Falling Apart: A Day in Conversation with Dr. Beverly J. Stoute Live Presentation Only Must be able to attend in person. No Zoom option is available. 11:00 am - 1:30 pm E pluribus unum: An American Fantasy? Presentation Open to the Community George Washington University […]

This event will be presented by Professor Brett Kahr: Although we have all encountered naked human bodies across our lifetime, very few of us have had the opportunity to explore the fully naked human mind, namely, the true contents of sexual thoughts and fantasies and unconscious wishes and unconscious fears. In this presentation on “Psychological […]

57th ANNIVERSARY FREUD LECTURE: The Revolution in North American Psychoanalysis: Enhancement or Betrayal The question asked in this paper is whether the various modifications taking place over the past 50 years are enhancing or undermining the core of psychoanalysis - namely the assumption that there are unconscious mental processes, a theory of resistance and repression, […]

Join Fred Busch PhD, for our next Meet the Author event with Dan Jacobs, MD, and the online audience.

Dr. Hannah Wallerstein address the recent shift towards was has been termed an “ontological” approach to psychoanalysis (Ogden 2019), in which experiencing and becoming oneself more fully are seen as the goals of treatment, with the generation of knowledge taking a back seat.

Dr. Santa Maria will present The Case of the Manufactured Child, examining the impact of assisted reproductive technology with a solo father on a child's development. She will discuss the father's perfectionism, the role of "self-matryoshka" (other mothers), the cultural implications of "manufacturing" a child, and how psychoanalytic psychotherapy can support children navigating complex psychological […]

This is a two-day program which is being presented in person and on Zoom. MANIFEST MIND CONFERENCE III: The Decentered Self in Psychedelic States What actually is the altered reality of psychedelic experience? Is there more... or less... of ones self? The experience of subjective dimensionality is a key scientific conundrum of our age. Sensed […]

This event will be presented by Dr. Jennifer Hanlin: Attendees will explore Philip Bromberg’s paper, Treating Patients with Symptoms—and Symptoms with Patience: Reflections on Shame, Dissociation, and Eating Disorders. Bromberg’s theory is that the therapist’s task is to allow themselves to slowly discover the patient’s multiplicity of self-states and the existing gap between the states. […]

Dr. Santa Maria will consider how technology has contributed to the subjective experience of living with AI and how it may be changing our relationship to the experience of otherness. This presentation will seek to generate discussion among the attendees about our emerging technological world and how AI may be impacting the conservation of our […]

Dear Nursing Colleagues Interested in Psychoanalysis: APsA's Advanced Practice in Nursing Committee will be hosting a free, online group mentorship Q&A on Sunday, May 18th, 2025 from 11am-12:30pm EDT/8am-9:30am PDT. Please pre-register to attend here and bring your questions and curiosity: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/Q8tJgOVZSaGeKHTaoUBpUA Click here to access the flyer and share with nursing professionals who are […]

If virtual, discussion starts at 4:15pm CDT. Please use link to learn all details. This film screening explores how psychotherapists and psychoanalysts are increasingly confronted with the question of whether an AI platform (ChatGPT, therapy bots, or a future operating system) can replace the therapy relationship and to what degree it can mimic it. This […]

Heather Ferguson, LCSW will present on the applicability of tragic consciousness in psychoanalytic work, focusing on the way in which the psychoanalytic relationship can aid in a patient developing such a form of consciousness.

Led by Salman Akhtar, MD. This presentation will open by discussing what poetry is in actuality. What are its components? From where does it originate? How does it exert a healing effect upon mental pain? Moving on from such issues, the presentation will highlight three links between poetry and psychoanalysis. These refer to the presence […]

In this seminar Dr. Lemma will critically review how psychoanalysis has approached the question of transgender identities and the challenges that have been proposed to the classical psychoanalytic understanding. She will introduce some key ethical points that are important for therapists working in this area. Finally, she will share some of her own clinical work […]

Led by Salman Akhtar, MD. While retaining the 'trio of guideposts' (Pine, 1997) constituted by anonymity, abstinence, and neutrality, contemporary psychoanalysis has witnessed many changes in its theoretical base and clinical praxis. These include (1) a greater developmental orientation, (ii) a tendency to judiciously accommodate the frame to the patient's sociocultural ethos, (iii) a greater […]