Families, Parents and Children: What can Psychodynamic-Psychoanalytic Treatment Offer?

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Presented by Tina Marie Dale, LCSW. This course is intended for clinicians new to the therapeutic field or those with little to no exposure to the psychodynamic approach thus far in their professional careers. We will look at what the psychodynamic approach can offer to clinicians treating families, treating children, and/or working with parents. We […]

Windows into Psychotherapy

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Presented by Stuart Ozar, MD and Juliana Varela, MSW. For clinicians or mental health students who are curious about what it is that psychodynamic therapists actually do, we offer a “window” into the process and a chance to connect an introduction to theory with actual clinical material. Each class will begin with a brief theoretical […]

Relational Identity & Erotic Orientation: Polyamory and Kink as Identity Constructs

St Louis Psychoanalytic Institute 7700 Clayton Rd Ste 200, Saint Louis, MO, United States

Presented by Gary Hirshberg, LCSW. This two session workshop will challenge clinicians to look at our own deeply held beliefs about sex and coupling, specifically what is ‘perversion’ and what is ‘healthy’ coupling. Most of us have come of age and been trained to still consider kink as deviant and as deriving from early childhood […]

Radical Psychoanalysis

Hybrid (In-Person and Virtual)

Presented by Harold Braswell, PhD, MSW. The word “radical” is generally understood to mean a break from tradition. But, etymologically, the term also connotes a return to one’s roots. A “radical” psychoanalysis would, in this sense, seem paradoxical—but perhaps, in the process, faithful to the nature of the unconscious itself. This course explores this paradoxical […]

Oppression Monopoly

St Louis Psychoanalytic Institute 7700 Clayton Rd Ste 200, Saint Louis, MO, United States

Presented by Richard D. Harvey, PhD. The Oppression Monopoly experience is quickly becoming widely known as a fun, yet deeply impactful simulation of the dynamics of oppression. The overriding theme of the experience is that the lived experience of minorities is systemic and intersectional and requires systemic and intersectional solutions. The experience has many learning […]

Writing & Creativity: A Psychoanalytic Retreat

St Louis Psychoanalytic Institute 7700 Clayton Rd Ste 200, Saint Louis, MO, United States

Presented by Nikki Karalekas, PhD, MSW, LCSW and Harold Braswell, MSW, PhD. How do we write psychoanalytically? How does psychoanalysis inform and enhance our writing practice? What role does writing have in clinical work? What is the relationship between writing, revision, and free association? How might we develop a psychoanalytically-informed understanding of—and treatment for—“writer’s block?” […]

Increasing Adaptive Racial Socialization for Black Boys: A Culturally Competent Psychodynamic Analysis

Hybrid (In-Person and Virtual) +1 more

Presented by Huey Hawkins Jr., PhD, LCSW. Black men living in America have been designated as an “endangered species” for a variety of reasons, namely the targeting and violence done to young Black men by police. Such experiences leave the parents of young Black boys to worry on a constant basis about the safety of […]

Dreaming of an Inclusive Psychoanalysis

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Presented in partnership with Casa de Salud’s Mental Health Collaborative with Patricia Gherovici, PhD; Harold Braswell, MSW, PhD and Juliana Varela, LCSW. Patricia Gherovici will compare two films documenting actual cures that push the boundaries of traditional psychoanalysis with two maverick psychoanalysts: Jimmy P: Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian, a 2013 French film by Arnaud […]

Truth, Reconciliation, and Reparation

Hybrid (In-Person and Virtual) +1 more

Presented by Paula Christian Kliger, PhD. Taking the position that a road paved with truth, reconciliation, and reparation is the road less traveled in our racial and sociocultural healing and our search for human resonance, this presentation seeks to face our toxic history and asks the question “How do we heal?” It also asks the […]

Traumatophilia: Notes on Libidinal Fugitivity

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Presented by Avgi Saketopoulou, Psy.D. Psychoanalytic thinking teaches us that trauma leaves the subject fractured, less agentic, more subject to iterative, stalled revisitations of the traumatic event. With the help of Jean Laplanche’s metapsychology, Saketopoulou will discuss how significant possibilities for psychic transformation and for contact with experience are courted when we make ourselves passible […]

What Then Must We Do? Social Work Ethics in a Time of Moral Injury

Phoebe Cirio, MSW, LCSW: In a world where there is a high level of strife and anxiety, and seemingly endless conflict, including war, ethnic violence, sexism and gender attacks, open displays of hostility within the United States, and the rapidly changing climate, the question arises what should we do? How does one in the mental […]

Suicidality: Learning from the Personal Experience of Suicidal People

Hybrid (In-Person and Virtual) +1 more

Phoebe Cirio, MSW, LCSW: William Styron vividly recounts the experience of his suicidal depression while suffering a breakdown in mid-life, in his small book Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness. Styron’s material will be a large part of the narrative basis for the class, which will be augmented with psychoanalytic theoretical material on the precipitants […]

I.H. Cohn Lecture: When the Teacher’s Feelings Hurt

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Edmund Sprunger, MSW, LCSW: Students sometimes seem to dismiss their teachers' best attempts to help them learn. They might ignore simple directions, roll their eyes, sigh, or mention that elephants are the only animal that cannot jump. Teachers can also feel disregarded by parents, who may attempt to discredit a teacher, fail to support their […]

Windows into Psychotherapy

Hybrid (In-Person and Virtual)

For clinicians or mental health students who are curious about what it is that psychodynamic therapists actually do, we offer a “window” into the process and a chance to connect an introduction to theory with actual clinical material. Each class will begin with a brief theoretical description of a core clinical concept, followed by the […]

The Independent Tradition in Child & Adolescent Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

This is an introductory course on the evolution of the Independent Tradition (British in origin) applied to our work with children and adolescents. This tradition (or approach) is developmentally appropriate to our work with younger populations, as it moves from the more epistemological (knowing) approach, with its emphasis on interpretation and insight, to a more […]

Paul A. Dewald Lecture: Developing a Stable Internal Home

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Aisha Abbasi, MD: Homesickness is a commonly used term, and a feeling that has been studied with interest, in psychoanalysis. The connection and distinction between homesickness and nostalgia has been noted in many analytic papers. Normal and pathological forms of both have been described. In this paper, Dr. Abbasi discusses the theoretical framework that informs […]

Judith Butler’s Psychoanalysis

Hybrid (In-Person and Virtual)

This course will focus on Butler’s experience and engagement with psychoanalysis, in order to explore what impact their thinking can hold for clinical practice. We will focus both on their early work concerning gender as well as more recent writings about non-violence.

Analytic Training Virtual Open House

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Curious about psychoanalytic education & training? Whether you're dipping your toes into the field or gearing up to apply, our virtual Open House is the perfect place to explore what's possible. Join us for an afternoon filled with insightful conversations, meaningful connections, and a welcoming community ready to share their experiences. Meet our esteemed faculty […]

Fingert Lecture: What Words Can’t Say. The Talking Cure and the Limits of Language

Virtual (Click on event title to advance to website and registration page)

Howard Levine, MD: Psychoanalysis is ‘the talking cure,’ but the problems raised by language are complex, paradoxical, and perhaps unsolvable. At their most effective, words play a vital role in psychic homeostatic regulation and the psychoanalytic process that is analogous to the architecturally structural role played by the keystone of an arch. The problem, however, […]

Creativity & Early Loss

Speaker: Chester Smith, MEd, LPC. Loss and trauma in general have long been understood to play a role in the creative process for many famous artists. Using the early histories of Munch, Van Gogh, and Picasso we will look at the role of loss as a contributor to their art. In this course we will […]

Writing and Psychoanalysis

Speakers: Harold Braswell, PhD & Nikki Karalekas, PhD. This course will explore the relationship between writing and psychoanalysis through a group workshop process. We will begin by holding two courses exploring the connection between psychoanalysis and writing: How do psychoanalysts work with difficulties that can arise during the creative process? How do we support our […]