This issue of Psychoanalytic Dialogues presents three major thematic discussions that showcase contemporary debates in psychoanalytic theory and practice.
The first section centers on race and psychoanalysis, initiated by Bernadine H. Han’s article Thinking Race: Exploring the Scene of Racial Enactment. Han’s work examines how racial dynamics manifest within the therapeutic relationship. Daniel José Gaztambide responds with Un(Thinking) Race, Resisting Knowing, Restoring the Social Third, exploring resistances to acknowledging racial realities in clinical work. Alexandra Woods contributes Thinking Race: Traversing Perilous Terrain with Bernadine Han, further developing these themes. Han concludes this exchange with her reply, Inviting and Meeting the Hyper-Real, addressing the commentaries and extending her original arguments.
The second major discussion revolves around psychedelic consciousness and its implications for psychoanalytic understanding. Karen Peoples and Megan Rundel’s article Expansion and Regression in Oceanic Experience: A Model of Psychedelic Consciousness for Psychoanalysis (open access) proposes a framework for integrating psychedelic experiences into psychoanalytic theory. Daniel A. Brenner responds with Expansion without Erasure: A Psychoanalytic Response to Peoples and Rundel, (open access) while Lawrence Fischman offers his discussion of the original piece. David Raniere contributes Looking Up at the Stars from the Middle of the Lake: Dare We Speak of Spirit? , questioning whether psychoanalysis can adequately address spiritual dimensions of psychedelic experience. Peoples and Rundel reply to these discussions in Expansion and Regression.
The final section explores Laplanchean theory in clinical practice. Sam Guzzardi’s Laplanche in the Consulting Room: An Emerging Paradigm for Psychoanalytic Therapeutic Action examines how Jean Laplanche’s theoretical contributions can inform therapeutic technique. Adam Blum responds provocatively with Fucking Free, while Daniel G. Butler contributes When What Preserves Tears Me Apart: The Lytic, the Therapeutic, the Impossible. Jade McGleughlin adds Between Restraint and Vertigo: Notes from the Fire Escape. Guzzardi concludes with Notes from the Après Coup, or, Jammin’ Out and Fuckin’ Free, responding to the discussants’ commentaries.