The “I do not…” Negation (Die Verneinung) and contemporary clinical practice
Bokanowski, Thierry
The “I do not…” Negation (Die Verneinung) and contemporary clinical practice - 2023.
61
Contemporary clinical practice as a whole is mobilized by the questions raised by the failures of certain psychoanalytic treatments (borderline or non-neurotic cases). They reveal a logic of functioning of a negativizing kind due to the fact that the use of negation undergoes a radical change of meaning in that it no longer refers to the latent meaning of the positive. Negativation is therefore at the centre of psychic modes of functioning that are obstinately resistant to change. The author points out that when negativizing expressions such as “I don’t know…” (denial), “I can’t remember…” (amnesic memory), “I don’t understand…” (disavowal), appear in the patient’s discourse after the analyst has intervened in a way that is experienced as decondensing, they testify to a negativity linked to the patient’s evacuation of the emotions mobilized by the intervention and amount to saying: “I hear what you are saying. You may be right, but it means nothing to me”. In other words, “It doesn’t make any sense to me”.
The “I do not…” Negation (Die Verneinung) and contemporary clinical practice - 2023.
61
Contemporary clinical practice as a whole is mobilized by the questions raised by the failures of certain psychoanalytic treatments (borderline or non-neurotic cases). They reveal a logic of functioning of a negativizing kind due to the fact that the use of negation undergoes a radical change of meaning in that it no longer refers to the latent meaning of the positive. Negativation is therefore at the centre of psychic modes of functioning that are obstinately resistant to change. The author points out that when negativizing expressions such as “I don’t know…” (denial), “I can’t remember…” (amnesic memory), “I don’t understand…” (disavowal), appear in the patient’s discourse after the analyst has intervened in a way that is experienced as decondensing, they testify to a negativity linked to the patient’s evacuation of the emotions mobilized by the intervention and amount to saying: “I hear what you are saying. You may be right, but it means nothing to me”. In other words, “It doesn’t make any sense to me”.
Réseaux sociaux