1st Edition

Jungian Perspectives on Indeterminate States Betwixt and Between Borders

Edited By Elizabeth Brodersen, Pilar Amezaga Copyright 2021
    298 Pages 15 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    298 Pages 15 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    In Jungian Perspectives on Indeterminate States: Betwixt and Between Borders, Elizabeth Brodersen and Pilar Amezaga bring together leading international contributors to analyse and interpret the psychological impact of contemporary border crossing - both literally and figuratively.

    Each chapter assesses key themes such as migration, culture, gender and identity formation, through a Jungian lens. All the contributors sensitively explore how creative forms can help mitigate the trauma experienced when one is forced to leave safety and enter unknown territory, and examines the specific role of indeterminacy, liminality and symbols as transformers at the border between culture, race and gender. The book asks whether we are able to hold these indeterminate states as creative liminal manifestations pointing to new forms, integrate the shadow ‘other’ as potential, and allow sufficient cross-border migration and fertilization as permissible. It makes clear that societal conflict represents a struggle for recognition and identity and elucidates the negative experiences of authoritarian structures attached to disrespect and misrecognitions.

    This interdisciplinary collection will offer key insight for Jungian analysts in practice and in training, psychotherapists, anthropologists, political and cultural theorists, and postgraduate researchers in psychosocial studies. It will also be of great interest to readers interested in migration, sexuality, gender, race and ethnicity studies.

    Part 1: Border, Migration and Identity

    1. Crossing physical borders and the making of identity: the case of Europe.

    Monica Luci

    2. Challenges to the individuation process of people on the move: developing a sense of global citizenship.

    Elisabetta Iberni

    3. The Mexican-American cultural complex: assessing the depth-psychological problems due to challenges of assimilation in American society.

    Valeria Cespedes Musso

    4. Hidden in plain sight: how therapists miss cultural trauma in trans-cultural white clients

    Rachael A. Vaughan

    Part 2: Border phenomenology and gender

    5. Ismail is now called Ebru and Lea wants to be a mechanic: transgender and intercultural work as a municipal task

    Elena Barta

    6. Child development and gender issues: symbols, creativity and alterity through sandplay therapy

    Denise Gimenez Ramos & Julia Kaddis El Khouri

    7. Bernini and the Pont Sant’ Angelo. The transcendent hermaphrodite as symbol of individuation

    William T. Farrar, IV

    8. Problems of symbolisation and archetypal processes: the case of male same-sex desire

    Giorgio Giaccardi

    Part 3: Liminality between borders and symbol formation

    9. An invisible magic circle: a Jungian commentary on When Marnie Was There

    Mathew Mather

    10. A Duality of the Japanese fish symbol: standing at the edge of life and death

    Yuka Ogiso

    11. Heart of Darkness: an archetypal journey to the other side

    Mirella Giglio

    Part 4: Border crossing and individuation

    12. Re-visioning individuation: opening to a witness consciousness

    Eileen Susan Nemeth

    13. The tension and paradox between determinate and indeterminate states: clinical, social and cultural aspects

    Toshio Kawai

    14. The consequence of freedom: moving beyond the intermediate states of broken individualization and liquidity

    Stefano Carpani

    15. Vulnerability and incorruptibility: an Aretaic model of the transcendent function

    Niccolo Fiorentino Polipo

    Biography

    Elizabeth Brodersen, PhD, is an accredited Training Analyst and Supervisor at the CGJI Zürich, Switzerland. Elizabeth received her doctorate in Psychoanalytic Studies from the University of Essex, UK, and works as a Jungian analyst in private practice in Germany and Switzerland. She is currently Co-Chair of The International Association for Jungian Studies (IAJS) with Dr. Kiley Laughlin.

    Pilar Amezaga, Jungian Analyst, is the Founder Member of the Uruguayan Society of Analytical Psychology and Professor at the Catholic University of Uruguay. She is currently Vice Pesident of the Executive Committee of the International Association for Analytical Psychology (IAAP) and member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Analytical Psychology.

    "In our contemporary geopolitical world of transience, mass migration, and social instability, difference, opposition, and alterity play a formidable role in the fluidity and imposed re-inscription of identity. In this important and timely book, Jungian analysts, academics, and social activists perspicaciously illuminate our current plight where diverse cultural complexes saturate our social collectives vying for protectionism, exclusionary praxis, and self-security at the expense of the ‘Other’ living in transitional states of uncertainty with no status value. This notable contribution to post-Jungian depth psychology will make you rethink your cherished assumptions about human sociability and the logic of containment in an uncontained world based on division, nihilism, and the indeterminacy of our looming collective shadow." - Professor Jon Mills, Psy.D., Ph.D., C.Psych., ABPP; Faculty, Postgraduate Programs in Psychoanalysis & Psychotherapy, Adler Graduate Professional School, Toronto; author and editor of numerous works on psychoanalysis including Jung and Philosophy (Routledge)

    "This is an innovative book of excellent and creative contributions presented at the 2018 Joint IAAP/IAJS Conference in Frankfurt on Indeterminate States. The collection of papers gives us the opportunity to reflect on states of life that are uncertain, unusual, not clearly defined, perhaps disturbing but in some way always innovative. The book shows how analytical psychology in particular contributes to understanding and dealing with such situations and processes and helps balance indeterminate and determinate states. It is a timely book and confronts us with the most critical questions of our time. The editors did a wonderful job in assembling all these papers. I wish this publication many interested readers." - Marianne Müller, Past President IAAP; Jungian Analyst, Bern, Switzerland

    "All too often conferences and the books they generate have vague and rag-bag themes with little genuine coherence. This book is the exception. Not only is the theme of liminality perfectly chosen for a psychology (Jung’s) that sits squarely on the difficult interface between the opposites, but it provides the writers of the chapters of this book with an opportunity to address some of the key issues of our time. Modern post-Jungian literature is finally addressing the psychosocial dimension, and this book provides a fascinating example, with chapters on topics like the psychology of migration across borders and the phenomenology of liminal gender. Throughout the volume, the range is immense, covering as it does clinical, ethical, cinematic and sociological topics. However, what holds the book together is an abiding awareness of the transformative possibilities that can emerge out of a willingness to stay with ambiguity." - Mark Saban, PhD, senior Jungian analyst with the Independent Group of Analytical Psychologists; lecturer at the Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex, UK; author, Two Souls Alas: Jung’s Two Personalities and the Making of Analytical Psychology (Chiron)