310: Inside and Out: Mutual Influences of Psychic and Social Realities
Instructors
Donald Moss, M.D.
March 5 – May 21, 2025
Wednesdays, 8:40 – 10:00 pm
Co-requisites
Candidates must have or have had at least two cases in supervised psychoanalysis to be eligible for upper level courses.
Course Description
Typically in our work we maintain an exclusive focus on the determining power of psychic reality. Psychic reality is thought to be the foundation of all our psychoanalytic understanding. This course will examine the undertheorized contributions of External Reality to individual experience and psychic development. We will discuss a variety of social formations and their impact on psychic life. In addition to taking on such pathological structures as racism, misogyny and homophobia, the course will explore ideology and false consciousness, the formation of our beliefs, and various forms of violence, including to the natural world. This course aims to uncover the multiple determinants of each of these phenomena, not only in unconscious fantasy, but also in unrecognized social forces. Embedded in this course will be a critique of our usual exclusive emphasis on psychic reality and individual development. Third and Fourth Year students combined.
Educational Objectives
Upon completion of this course, participants will be able to:
- describe how social realities impact the development of our minds.
- discuss the interplay between the psyche and society, including the impact of race,
homophobia and our place in the natural world
Evaluation Method
Each student’s participation in class discussion and demonstration of understanding of the course objectives, readings and clinical material is assessed in a written evaluation by the instructor(s).
These articles are protected under relevant copyright regulations. They are available in the New York Psychoanalytic Society & Institute Electronic Reserve for your convenience, and for your personal use.
READINGS ARE CONFIRMED FOR FIRST 6 SESSIONS.
Session I. Idealogy and Discussion of the Film “Pressure Point”
CLASS 1: March 5, 2025
Guest Instructor: Ben Kafka, Ph.D.
REQUIRED VIDEO
Cornfield, H. (Director). (1962). Pressure Point [Film]. Larcas Productions.
PLEASE WATCH on your streaming service before class.
(“Ideology” refers to the cultural/ideational/erotic air we breathe– a set of baseline premises that constitute the platform on which our individual psychic apparatus rests.)
REQUIRED READING
Baranger, W. (1958). The Ego and the Function of Ideology. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 39:191-195.
Session II. Discussion of the Film “I am not Your Negro”
CLASS 2: March 12, 2025
Instructor: Donald Moss, M.D.
REQUIRED VIDEO
Peck, R. (Director). (2016). I Am Not Your Negro [Film]. Magnolia Pictures.
PLEASE WATCH on your streaming service before class.
(As we watch James Baldwin contend with the assassinations of MLK, Malcolm X and Medgar Evans, perhaps we can also ask ourselves what kinds of assassinations we are contending with and how we are doing it. Let’s try to find our way into identifying with Baldwin.)
REQUIRED READING
Baldwin, J. (2017). Notes of a Native Son. Penguin Classics. [Read Chapter: Notes of a Native Son]
Session III. Trans Issues
CLASS 3: March 19, 2025
Guest Instructor: Jack Drescher, M.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Drescher, J. (2023). Special Report: Evolving Controversies in the Treatment of Gender Dysphoric/Incongruent Minors. Psychiatric News, 58(06). https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.pn.2023.06.6.27
Session IV. Environment
CLASS 4: March 26, 2025
Guest Instructor: Lindsay Clarkson, M.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Searles, H. F. (1972). Unconscious Processes in Relation to the Environmental Crisis. Psychoanalytic Review, 59:361-374.
Session V. Homophobia
CLASS 5: April 2, 2025
Guest Instructor: Sidney H. Phillips, M.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Moss, D. (2002). Internalized Homophobia in Men: Wanting in the First Person Singular, Hating in the First Person Plural. Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 71:21-50.
Phillips, S. The Fate of Internalized Homophobia in Gay Parenting. (unpublished)
Session VI.
CLASS 6: April 9, 2025
Guest Instructor: Dorothy Holmes, Ph.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Anen, S. (2022). Narcissistic States of White Privilege and the Constructive Potential of Shame. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 32:621-638.
Holmes, D. E. (2022). Getting to Where We Need to Get: A Meaningful Step Towards Understanding and Remedying White Privilege. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 32:639-644.
Session VII. Racism
CLASS 7: April 16, 2025
Instructor: Donald Moss, M.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Moss, D. (2021) On Having Whiteness. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, 69:355-371.
Session VIII. Misogyny
CLASS 8: April 23, 2025
Guest Instructor: Lynne Zeavin, Psy.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Session IX. Sexual Violence
CLASS 9: April 30, 2025
Instructor: Donald Moss, M.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Session X. TBD
CLASS 10: May 7, 2025
Guest Instructor: TBD
REQUIRED READINGS
Session XI. Idealization of Motherhood
CLASS 11: May 14, 2025
Guest Instructor: Lynne Zeavin, Psy.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Session XII. Postmodern Fascism and Eugenic Fantasies
CLASS 12: May 21, 2025
Guest Instructor: Dagmar Herzog, Ph.D.
REQUIRED READINGS
Adorno, T. W. (1951). “Freudian Theory and the Pattern of Fascist Propaganda.” In G. Róheim, Psychoanalysis and the Social Sciences, Vol. 3, pp. 279-300. International Universities Press.