YEAR 4 CLASS 2021-2022

CONTEMPORARY BION (INTERSUBJECTIVE/ FIELD THEORY & TECHNIQUE)

Dr. Gordon Yanchyshyn

Many analytic thinkers have extended and modified Wilfred Bion’s ideas, and they can be
loosely grouped under the heading “Intersubjective/ Field” theory and technique. These three
seminars represent only a sampling, omitting other important contributors like Madeleine and
Willy Baranger, James Grotstein and Giuseppe Civitarese.

Core Concepts:
● Use of the analyst’s reverie to understand and interpret
transference-countertransference
● Transformations in dreaming
● The analytic session as a dream
● Formation of an analytic field
● Characters in the field
● Development of α function
● Intersubjective processes in clinical work
● Theoretical links between Bion and Matte Blanco

Keywords:
● reverie, transference-countertransference, intersubjective, α function,
container-contained, analytic field, waking dream, transformations, joke-work,
symmetrical/asymmetrical thinking

Supplementary Overview Reading:

(In the spirit of a comparative-integrative approach, I have included this recent article for your
interest:)

Ogden, T.H. (2020). Toward a Revised Form of Psychoanalytic Thinking and Practice.
Psychoanal. Q. 89(2): 219-243. (ShareFile)
November 8, 2021 (Seminar 1)

Required Reading:

Ogden, T.H. (1997). Reverie and Interpretation. Psychoanal. Q. 66: 567-596. (ShareFile)

November 15, 2021 (Seminar 1)

Required Reading:

Ferro, A. (2005). Seeds of Illness, Seeds of Recovery. (Routledge, NY, 2103), pp. 23-52
(ShareFile --- *pp. 53-62 are optional*)

Lombardi, R. (2009). Symmetric frenzy and catastrophic change. Int. J. Psychoanal. 90:
529-549. (PEP Web)

November 22, 2021 (Seminar 1)

Required Reading:

Brown, L.J. (2019). Transformational Processes in Clinical Psychoanalysis. (Routledge, NY),

Ch. 8, pp. 139-154. (ShareFile)

Brown, L.J. (2011). Intersubjective Processes and the Unconscious. (Routledge, NY),
pp. 124-137. (ShareFile)