Psychoanalysis and Climate Change: Facing the Climate Crisis Inside and Outside the Consulting Room

1–2 minutes

AN ONLINE CONFERENCE SPONSORED BY THE MANHATTAN INSTITUTE FOR PSYCHOANALYSIS AND THE SÁNDOR FERENCZI CENTER AT THE NEW SCHOOL FOR SOCIAL RESEARCH

We are besieged daily by images of fire, flood, and drought, by news of massive species

extinctions and destruction of ecosystems, and by terrifying stories of displacement and

loss. In our clinical work, we share this traumatic context with our patients and are profoundly

affected, whether consciously or without awareness.

Historically, psychoanalysis has struggled to integrate the social, the political and the clinical

into our theory and practice. We have too often retreated in the face of massive social

problems. We cannot let this happen in response to this existential crisis. This conference

brings together clinicians and psychoanalysts who are actively engaged with the climate

emergency, as well as a youth climate activist who represents the essential perspective of

the next generation. We present this conference in order to explore the crucial role that

psychoanalysis can play in confronting the climate crisis and to encourage our community to

oppose the embedded social and political challenges of environmental injustice. Our goal is

to initiate a conversation that will inspire thinking, feeling and action.

Session I: Saturday, December 5, 2020: 1pm to 4:30pm EST (10:00AM-1:30PM PST)

Lise Van Susteren, MD
Framing the Climate Crisis Psychologically

Robert Jay Lifton, MD
Climate Change and Witnessing Professionals

Renee Lertzman, PhD
Beyond Anxiety and Ambivalence: An Overview of Psychoanalytic Contributions to our Climate Crisis

Daniel Gaztambide, PsyD
Afropessimism, Climate Change, and “The End”: Puerto Rican Reflections on anti-Blackness and Ecological Crisis

Session II: Saturday, December 12, 2020: 1pm to 4:30pm EST (10:00-1:30 PST)

Robert Stolorow, PhD
Planet Earth: Crumbling Metaphysical Illusion

Clinical Panel:

Wendy Greenspun, PhD
Frozen in Trauma on a Warming Planet: A Relational Reckoning with Climate Distress

Elizabeth Allured, PsyD
The Illusion of a Future: Adolescents Face Smoke and Mirrors with a Good Enough and Bad Enough Eco-Analyst

Katie Gentile, PhD
Beyond Anxiety and Ambivalence: An Overview of Psychoanalytic Contributions to our Climate Crisis

Vic Barrett, Youth Climate Activist
A Youth Climate Activist’s Journey with the Climate Crisis and the Environmental Justice Movement

For more information and to register click here

Discover more from Psychoanalysis and Social Justice

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.