1st Edition

A Clinical Application of Bion's Concepts Dreaming, Transformation, Containment and Change

By P.C. Sandler Copyright 2009
    392 Pages
    by Routledge

    392 Pages
    by Routledge

    This work depicts clinical applications stemming from Dr Wilfred Ruprecht Bion's contributions to psychoanalysis. It may be used as a practical companion to The Language of Bion: A Dictionary of Concepts also by P.C. Sandler. Both constitute a natural arrangement of Bion's concepts; "natural" being the help the selected concepts may provide to any analyst who understands and uses the observations underlying the concepts effectively in his or her everyday clinical work. It also contains expansions of Bion's concepts arising out of clinical observations, made possible by those very contributions - a common-sense invariant in science. Universes of hitherto unknown - but existing - facts are observed, and through observation and application expanding universes are unlocked to consciousness (and therefore awareness). Some chapters will help the reader understand Bion's original concepts and apply them in clinical practice. Other chapters are more explicit and go beyond what was adumbrated or indicated by Bion, in the light of phenomena observed against the background of Bion's contributions. These chapters also indicate the intertwined nature of his contributions.

    Introduction -- Real Life is the Stuff Dreams are Made of -- A space-time context for Freud’s “Interpretation of Dreams” -- “The Interpretation of Dreams”: a scientific tradition and resistance to it -- Old wine in new bottles: authors reviving Freud’s psychoanalytic ethos -- Bion’s exploration of the “royal road” -- Functions of dreams -- Clinical illustrations -- Transformations and Invariants -- Observation and communication -- Clinical illustrations -- Container and Contained -- Bion’s theory of container and contained -- Empirical sources: container and contained in the clinic -- Catastrophic Change -- Catastrophic change or fear of change felt as catastrophe? -- When addiction means diminution: clinical illustrations

    Biography

    P.C. Sandler