Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen
Encyclopedia
Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen is Professor of Comparative Literature
and French
at the University of Washington
in Seattle. Born to Danish
parents, he began his studies in France
and emigrated to the United States in 1986. He is the author of many works on the history and philosophy of psychiatry
, psychoanalysis
and hypnosis
. His constructivist
analysis of the co-production of psychical "facts" emphasises the accuracy of historical accounts of mental disorders. He is known for his positions in virulent debates about psychoanalysis
– called the Freud Wars – especially with regard to his 2005 publication of Le Livre noir de la psychanalyse ("The Black Book of Psychoanalysis"). In a review entitled Folies à plusieurs. De l'hystérie à la dépression ("Many madnesses. From hysteria to depression"), Pierre-Henri Castel calls Borch-Jacobsen "one of the most polemic thinkers with regard to the Freud Wars".
with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe
and Jean-Luc Nancy
, two philosophers close in thought to, and in dialogue with, Jacques Derrida
and Jacques Lacan
.
In 1981 at the University of Strasbourg
he submitted his doctoral dissertation on The Freudian Subject and then began teaching in the department of Psychoanalysis
at Vincennes University in Paris, where Jacques Lacan
had first made his mark.
In 1986 he emigrated to the United States.
at the Hôpital Fernand-Widal where he joined such other as Léon Chertok
, René Girard
and François Roustang in the discussion of hypnosis
. The following year, he published with Éric Michaud and Jean-Luc Nancy
, Hypnoses. In this book, the authors consider the whole history of therapeutic hypnosis
, the psychological
or sociological
theory becoming suspect to dangerous regressions from intellectual, ethical and political ideas.
On 21 January 1985, he presented a conference paper entitled ("Hypnosis in psychoanalysis") to the Society of Psychosomatic Medicine. The text of this paper was then published in collaboration with Chertok in 1987, with replies from many psychoanalysists, philosophers and sociologists, such as Georges Lapassade, Octave Mannoni
and Franklin Rausky.
In this paper, Borch-Jacobsen presented evidence that psychoanalytic transference
is a form of altered state of consciousness
, comparable with those that had existed in the work of pschotherapies which predate psychoanalysis, from Shamanism
to the hypnotism of the Nancy School
, by way of animal magnetism
. He averred that "" ("On Freud's own admission, the phenomenon of transference is nothing other than the resurgence, in the bosom of [psycho]analytical techniques, of the characteristic relationship (of 'rapport') of hypnosis techniques: dependence, submission, or again... exclusive worship of the doctor"). He emphasised that there is consequently an important risk of suggestion
on the part of the psychoanalyst, even more so when the psychoanalyst himself is not conscious of these phenomena.
Borch-Jacobsen then reaffirmed that Sigmund Freud
, after having started to use suggestive hypnotic psychotherapy on Hippolyte Bernheim
in 1887 replaced it with the cathartic method in 1899, no longer using hypnosis as a means of direct suggestion, but to bring out suppressed feelings of patients' traumas. After practicing using free association
in 1892, Freud totally abandoned hypnosis at the end of 1896. This is explained in the following manner by Chertok: "" ("In his opposition to hypnosis, Freud was known to have founded a scientific psychotherapy
, destined, as such, to become the psychotherapy par excellence. The interpretation and the capture of consciousness thus becomes the fulcrum of the cure. The effectiveness of the new method certainly could not be discounted, but in it one can find it being channelled into transference, and by that, come to dominate the consciousness and put it to work. Such was the ambition of the Founder of Psychoanalysis [Freud], and the turn of the century was once again filled with positivity"). It is precisely this posture of Freud's that the consciousness is "dominated" that was put into question by Borch-Jacobsen.
Bertrand Méheust rebuked Borch-Jacobsen for accepting without further discussion a dated view of hypnotherapy, bequeathed by the positivist institutional medicine of the 19th century. Furthermore, he argues that hypnosis follows a state of absolute passivity and therefore hurts well-being, and that hypnosis is induced in someone in which all consciousness is disconnected, a being totally immersed in the inner self, indeed a puppet who thinks and lives totally by the workings of another. He takes sides with Puységur and Deleuze, stating that lucid, magnetic
phenomena are assumed to establish a kind of synergy
between the higher functions of intelligence and the immediacy of instinct.
, "Anna O.", subtitled ("A 100-year-old mystery"), in which, according to Claude Meyer, he "" ("came to terms with one of the founding myths of psychoanalysis"). It is also the opinion of Elizabeth Loentz, who had also written a book on Pappenheim, and Paul Roazen
, who considers this work a major stage of university and historiographical work on psychoanalysis, and a fly in the ointment of the "defenders of the status quo"
), Galilée, 1984. ("Hypnosis and psyhoanalysis") (with Léon Chertok
), Dunod, 1987., ("Lacan, the absolute master"), Stanford University Press
, 1991. ("The Emotional Tie"), Aubier Montaigne, 1992. ("Memoirs of Anna O.: A 100-year old mystery"), 1996. ("Many madnesses: from hysteria to depression"), Les Empêcheurs de penser en rond, 2002. ("Constructivism and psychoanalysis") (with Bernard Granger, debates with Georges Fischman), Le Cavalier Bleu, 2005. ("The Black Book of psychoanalysis") (with Jean Cottraux, Jacques Van Rillaer, Didier Pleux) (Catherine Meyer, ed.), Les Arènes, 2005. ("Freud's dossier. An inquiry on the history of psychoanalysis") (with Sonu Shamdasani), Les Empêcheurs de penser en rond, 2006.
Comparative literature
Comparative literature is an academic field dealing with the literature of two or more different linguistic, cultural or national groups...
and French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
at the University of Washington
University of Washington
University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...
in Seattle. Born to Danish
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
parents, he began his studies in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and emigrated to the United States in 1986. He is the author of many works on the history and philosophy of psychiatry
Psychiatry
Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the study and treatment of mental disorders. These mental disorders include various affective, behavioural, cognitive and perceptual abnormalities...
, psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is a psychological theory developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud. Psychoanalysis has expanded, been criticized and developed in different directions, mostly by some of Freud's former students, such as Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav...
and hypnosis
Hypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...
. His constructivist
Constructivism
Constructivism may refer to:* Constructivist epistemology, the philosophical view* Constructivism in international relations* Constructivism , a philosophical view on mathematical proofs and existence of mathematical objects...
analysis of the co-production of psychical "facts" emphasises the accuracy of historical accounts of mental disorders. He is known for his positions in virulent debates about psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is a psychological theory developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud. Psychoanalysis has expanded, been criticized and developed in different directions, mostly by some of Freud's former students, such as Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav...
– called the Freud Wars – especially with regard to his 2005 publication of Le Livre noir de la psychanalyse ("The Black Book of Psychoanalysis"). In a review entitled Folies à plusieurs. De l'hystérie à la dépression ("Many madnesses. From hysteria to depression"), Pierre-Henri Castel calls Borch-Jacobsen "one of the most polemic thinkers with regard to the Freud Wars".
Biography
Borch-Jacobsen studied philosophyPhilosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe
Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe
Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe was a French philosopher. He was also a literary critic and translator....
and Jean-Luc Nancy
Jean-Luc Nancy
Jean-Luc Nancy is a French philosopher.Nancy's first book, published in 1973, was Le titre de la lettre , a reading of the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, written in collaboration with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe...
, two philosophers close in thought to, and in dialogue with, Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...
and Jacques Lacan
Jacques Lacan
Jacques Marie Émile Lacan was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist who made prominent contributions to psychoanalysis and philosophy, and has been called "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud". Giving yearly seminars in Paris from 1953 to 1981, Lacan influenced France's...
.
In 1981 at the University of Strasbourg
University of Strasbourg
The University of Strasbourg in Strasbourg, Alsace, France, is the largest university in France, with about 43,000 students and over 4,000 researchers....
he submitted his doctoral dissertation on The Freudian Subject and then began teaching in the department of Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is a psychological theory developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud. Psychoanalysis has expanded, been criticized and developed in different directions, mostly by some of Freud's former students, such as Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav...
at Vincennes University in Paris, where Jacques Lacan
Jacques Lacan
Jacques Marie Émile Lacan was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist who made prominent contributions to psychoanalysis and philosophy, and has been called "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud". Giving yearly seminars in Paris from 1953 to 1981, Lacan influenced France's...
had first made his mark.
In 1986 he emigrated to the United States.
Hypnosis
In 1983, Borch-Jacobsen participated in a meeting on the subject of hypnosisHypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...
at the Hôpital Fernand-Widal where he joined such other as Léon Chertok
Léon Chertok
Léon Chertok , was a French psychiatrist known for his work on hypnosis and psychosomatic medicine.-Biography:...
, René Girard
René Girard
René Girard is a French historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science. His work belongs to the tradition of anthropological philosophy...
and François Roustang in the discussion of hypnosis
Hypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...
. The following year, he published with Éric Michaud and Jean-Luc Nancy
Jean-Luc Nancy
Jean-Luc Nancy is a French philosopher.Nancy's first book, published in 1973, was Le titre de la lettre , a reading of the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, written in collaboration with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe...
, Hypnoses. In this book, the authors consider the whole history of therapeutic hypnosis
Hypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...
, the psychological
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
or sociological
Sociology
Sociology is the study of society. It is a social science—a term with which it is sometimes synonymous—which uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop a body of knowledge about human social activity...
theory becoming suspect to dangerous regressions from intellectual, ethical and political ideas.
On 21 January 1985, he presented a conference paper entitled ("Hypnosis in psychoanalysis") to the Society of Psychosomatic Medicine. The text of this paper was then published in collaboration with Chertok in 1987, with replies from many psychoanalysists, philosophers and sociologists, such as Georges Lapassade, Octave Mannoni
Octave Mannoni
Dominique-Octave Mannoni was a French psychoanalyst and author. After spending more than twenty years in Madagascar, Mannoni returned to France after World War II where he, inspired by Lacan, published several psychoanalytic books and articles...
and Franklin Rausky.
In this paper, Borch-Jacobsen presented evidence that psychoanalytic transference
Transference
Transference is a phenomenon in psychoanalysis characterized by unconscious redirection of feelings from one person to another. One definition of transference is "the inappropriate repetition in the present of a relationship that was important in a person's childhood." Another definition is "the...
is a form of altered state of consciousness
Altered state of consciousness
An altered state of consciousness , also named altered state of mind, is any condition which is significantly different from a normal waking beta wave state. The expression was used as early as 1966 by Arnold M. Ludwig and brought into common usage from 1969 by Charles Tart: it describes induced...
, comparable with those that had existed in the work of pschotherapies which predate psychoanalysis, from Shamanism
Shamanism
Shamanism is an anthropological term referencing a range of beliefs and practices regarding communication with the spiritual world. To quote Eliade: "A first definition of this complex phenomenon, and perhaps the least hazardous, will be: shamanism = technique of ecstasy." Shamanism encompasses the...
to the hypnotism of the Nancy School
Nancy School
The Nancy School was an early French suggestion-centred school of psychotherapy founded in 1866 by Ambroise-Auguste Liébeault, a follower of the theory of Abbé Faria, in the city of Nancy....
, by way of animal magnetism
Animal magnetism
Animal magnetism , in modern usage, refers to a person's sexual attractiveness or raw charisma. As postulated by Franz Mesmer in the 18th century, the term referred to a supposed magnetic fluid or ethereal medium believed to reside in the bodies of animate beings...
. He averred that "" ("On Freud's own admission, the phenomenon of transference is nothing other than the resurgence, in the bosom of [psycho]analytical techniques, of the characteristic relationship (of 'rapport') of hypnosis techniques: dependence, submission, or again... exclusive worship of the doctor"). He emphasised that there is consequently an important risk of suggestion
Suggestion
Suggestion is the psychological process by which one person guides the thoughts, feelings, or behaviour of another. Nineteenth century writers on psychology such as William James used the words "suggest" and "suggestion" in senses close to those they have in common speech—one idea was said to...
on the part of the psychoanalyst, even more so when the psychoanalyst himself is not conscious of these phenomena.
Borch-Jacobsen then reaffirmed that Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud , born Sigismund Schlomo Freud , was an Austrian neurologist who founded the discipline of psychoanalysis...
, after having started to use suggestive hypnotic psychotherapy on Hippolyte Bernheim
Hippolyte Bernheim
Hippolyte Bernheim was a French physician and neurologist, born at Mülhausen, Alsace. He received his education in his native town and at the University of Strasbourg, where he was graduated as doctor of medicine in 1867...
in 1887 replaced it with the cathartic method in 1899, no longer using hypnosis as a means of direct suggestion, but to bring out suppressed feelings of patients' traumas. After practicing using free association
Free association (psychology)
Free association is a technique used in psychoanalysis which was originally devised by Sigmund Freud out of the hypnotic method of his mentor and coworker, Josef Breuer....
in 1892, Freud totally abandoned hypnosis at the end of 1896. This is explained in the following manner by Chertok: "" ("In his opposition to hypnosis, Freud was known to have founded a scientific psychotherapy
Psychotherapy
Psychotherapy is a general term referring to any form of therapeutic interaction or treatment contracted between a trained professional and a client or patient; family, couple or group...
, destined, as such, to become the psychotherapy par excellence. The interpretation and the capture of consciousness thus becomes the fulcrum of the cure. The effectiveness of the new method certainly could not be discounted, but in it one can find it being channelled into transference, and by that, come to dominate the consciousness and put it to work. Such was the ambition of the Founder of Psychoanalysis [Freud], and the turn of the century was once again filled with positivity"). It is precisely this posture of Freud's that the consciousness is "dominated" that was put into question by Borch-Jacobsen.
Bertrand Méheust rebuked Borch-Jacobsen for accepting without further discussion a dated view of hypnotherapy, bequeathed by the positivist institutional medicine of the 19th century. Furthermore, he argues that hypnosis follows a state of absolute passivity and therefore hurts well-being, and that hypnosis is induced in someone in which all consciousness is disconnected, a being totally immersed in the inner self, indeed a puppet who thinks and lives totally by the workings of another. He takes sides with Puységur and Deleuze, stating that lucid, magnetic
Animal magnetism
Animal magnetism , in modern usage, refers to a person's sexual attractiveness or raw charisma. As postulated by Franz Mesmer in the 18th century, the term referred to a supposed magnetic fluid or ethereal medium believed to reside in the bodies of animate beings...
phenomena are assumed to establish a kind of synergy
Synergy
Synergy may be defined as two or more things functioning together to produce a result not independently obtainable.The term synergy comes from the Greek word from , , meaning "working together".-Definitions and usages:...
between the higher functions of intelligence and the immediacy of instinct.
The case of Anna O.
In 1996 he completed a treatise on the case of Bertha PappenheimBertha Pappenheim
Bertha Pappenheim was an Austrian-Jewish feminist, a social pioneer, and the founder of the Jüdischer Frauenbund .- Youth :...
, "Anna O.", subtitled ("A 100-year-old mystery"), in which, according to Claude Meyer, he "" ("came to terms with one of the founding myths of psychoanalysis"). It is also the opinion of Elizabeth Loentz, who had also written a book on Pappenheim, and Paul Roazen
Paul Roazen
Paul Roazen was a political scientist who became a preeminent historian of psychoanalysis.Roazen studied at Harvard University and in Chicago and Oxford. Later he returned to Harvard. The subject of his dissertation was Freud's political thinking...
, who considers this work a major stage of university and historiographical work on psychoanalysis, and a fly in the ointment of the "defenders of the status quo"
Le Livre noir de la psychanalyse
In 2005 he collaborated in writing ("The Black Book of Psychoanalysis"), a book which received a great reception and has been the subject of several commentaries.Publications
("The Freudian Subject"), Flammarion, 1982 (revised in 1992 with a preface by François Roustang in the English version). (with Éric Michaud and Jean-Luc NancyJean-Luc Nancy
Jean-Luc Nancy is a French philosopher.Nancy's first book, published in 1973, was Le titre de la lettre , a reading of the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, written in collaboration with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe...
), Galilée, 1984. ("Hypnosis and psyhoanalysis") (with Léon Chertok
Léon Chertok
Léon Chertok , was a French psychiatrist known for his work on hypnosis and psychosomatic medicine.-Biography:...
), Dunod, 1987., ("Lacan, the absolute master"), Stanford University Press
Stanford University Press
The Stanford University Press is the publishing house of Stanford University. In 1892, an independent publishing company was established at the university. The first use of the name "Stanford University Press" in a book's imprinting occurred in 1895...
, 1991. ("The Emotional Tie"), Aubier Montaigne, 1992. ("Memoirs of Anna O.: A 100-year old mystery"), 1996. ("Many madnesses: from hysteria to depression"), Les Empêcheurs de penser en rond, 2002. ("Constructivism and psychoanalysis") (with Bernard Granger, debates with Georges Fischman), Le Cavalier Bleu, 2005. ("The Black Book of psychoanalysis") (with Jean Cottraux, Jacques Van Rillaer, Didier Pleux) (Catherine Meyer, ed.), Les Arènes, 2005. ("Freud's dossier. An inquiry on the history of psychoanalysis") (with Sonu Shamdasani), Les Empêcheurs de penser en rond, 2006.
Awards
- 1987 – Prix de la Psyché (awarded by the )
- 1994 – The Salomon Katz Distinguished Lectureship in the Humanities, University of Washington
- 1997 – Gradiva Award for Best General Book (awarded by the National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis).
External links
- ("Therapy users and illness producers"), by Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen
- A Zero Theory, by Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen
- International Network of Freud Critics