Michaela Chamberlain, "Misogyny in Psychoanalysis" (Phoenix Publishing House, 2022)
Today I talked to Michaela Chamberlain, author of\xa0Misogyny in Psychoanalysis\xa0(Phoenix Publishing House, 2022)\nChamberlain\u2019s book is a product of \u201ccumulative trauma\u201d whose original starting point was an interest in in menstruation where, in psychoanalytic literature filled with papers on \u201cmicturition and feces\u201d, there is a \u201cstartling lack of writing on the monthly passing of menstrual blood.\u201d Chamberlain realized that this absence was a symptom of something bigger. That something is misogyny.\nWorking with a definition attributed to Kate Manne[1]\xa0misogyny is seen as \u201cthe law enforcement branch of sexism\u201d and Chamberlain argues that we really have \u201cto grapple with the law enforcement of the male gaze. The minute you free yourself from this or at least know what you\u2019re fighting it means you can think all sorts of things. The more we straightjacket ourselves with the laws of Freud the more we are lessening the possibilities for creativity, which surely has to be the point of psychoanalysis.\u201d\n\u201cWe need to take on the trauma that\u2019s been caused by past analytic gods and really examine the continued use of psychoanalytic terms owned by a man to apply a man-made theory to women\u201d and a discipline that has historically had \u201cno trust in women to adequately understand their own experience.\u201d Chamberlain references her training where the phrase \u201cBowlby said\u201d was a way to remind her \u201cto pay respect to her male elders and keep to my place. The analyst expected me to swallow the comment as truth in much the same was as Freud quotes are given to remind everyone of the rules of play.\u201d\nAfter reviewing the foundations of psychoanalysis and the continued reification of the clearly misogynistic Oedipus complex, Chamberlain turns her focus to how this misogyny gets played out in the clinical setting. Chapter 4 \u201cThe misogynistic introject \u2013 a case study\u201d is a painful story of a mother whose insight into the struggles of her child are rapidly dismissed \u201cbecause she is the mother\u201d.\nIn this interview, recorded in May of 2023, Chamberlain observes that psychoanalytic institutes have yet to engage with the public protests around misogyny, the Women's Safety Movement, #MeToo, and #ReclaimTheseStreets. Whereas the Black Lives Matter movement has finally entered psychoanalytic institutes in the form of trainings, conferences, supervisions, and groups aimed at confronting legacies of racism in psychoanalysis no such movement has occurred with regards to misogyny following the horrific murder of Sarah Everard at the hands of a police officer in 2021 when the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, stated that \u201cLondon streets are not safe for women or girls\u201d and 50% of UK women reported they did not feel safe leaving their homes after dark.\nMisogyny in Psychoanalysis argues that women\u2019s experience in psychoanalysis has been \u201cnegatively hallucinated\u201d and that \u201cWhat is needed for psychoanalysis to take the brave first step of putting itself on the couch to grapple fully with its unconscious fantasies about women and begin coping with what it working hard not to see.\u201d\n[1]\xa0Manne, K. (2018). Down Girl: The Logic of Misogyny. United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.\n\ufeffChristopher Russell, LP is a psychoanalyst in Chelsea, Manhattan.\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices\nSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies