Saturday, October 26th
10 am-12 pm
Colloquium: Freud and Free Speech: A Conversation Between Psychoanalysis and Democracy
Free event & open to the public
Presenters:
Jill Gentile, Ph.D., NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis
John Ferejohn, Ph.D., Samuel Tilden Professor of Law, NYU Law School
Pasquale Pasquino, Ph.D., Global Distinguished Professor of Politics, NYU
Moderator of Roundtable:
Steve Botticelli, Ph.D., NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis
Roundtable Participant:
Seth Warren, Ph.D., Director, Center for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy of New Jersey
Abstract:
Both psychoanalysts and Americans tend to take free speech as a core value. But today, with psychoanalysis’ relational turn, free association is seldom discussed. Meanwhile, recent controversial Court decisions have challenged (if not degraded) the status of the First Amendment. We’ll contemplate the origins of the interplay between free association and democracy that emerged in classical Greece; the potential contributions of psychoanalysis to the cultivation of (and necessary boundaries to) democratic ideals; and how specific relational contexts are relevant to any genuine approximation of free speech in civil society. We’ll ask: What is “free” speech in the context of a human relationship with a real Other? What are the implications for hate speech? For the analyst’s speech and the patient’s speech? How can analytic discoveries help foster a more democratic society? Join us as we begin this conversation.
The classical tradition was anything but democratic. See http://clarespark.com/2009/08/24/the-people-is-an-ass-or-a-herd/. Considers the dispute between Robert Filmer and John Locke in the seventeenth century. Locke wins on the democracy question. And “the Other” is a suspect formulation for me. Read the Filmer quote.
Reblogged this on Knitting Clio and commented:
Looks interesting.