The Primitive Edge of Experience'This is an extraordinary and exciting book, the work of a truly original and creative psychoanalytic theoretician and most astute clinician. Ogden continues to expand and to deepen his reformulations of the British object-relations theorists, M. Klein, W. R. Bion, D. W. Winnicott, W. R. D. Fairbairn, H. Guntrip, to illuminate further the world of internalized object relations. His concepts are evolutionary and at times revolutionary. Exploring the area of human experience that lies beyond the psychological territories addressed by the previous theorists, he introduces the concept of an autistic-contiguous mode as a way of conceiving of the most primitive psychological organization through which the sensory 'floor' of the experience of self is generated. He conceives of this mode as a sensory-dominated, presymbolic area of experience in which the most primitive form of meaning is generated on the basis of organization of sensory impressions, particularly at the skin surface. A major tenet in the book is a conceptualization of human experience throughout life as the product of a dialectical interplay among three modes of generating experience: the depressive, the paranoid-schizoid, and the autistic-contiguous. Each mode creates, preserves, and negates the other. No single mode of generating experience exists independently of the others. Psychopathology is conceptualized as a 'collapse' of the dialectic in the direction of one or another mode of generating experience. The outcome of such collapse may be entrapment in rigid, asymbolic patterns of sensation (collapse in the direction of the autistic-contiguous mode), or imprisonment in a world of omnipotent internal objects where thoughts and feelings are experienced as things and forces which occupy or bombard the self (collapse in the direction of paranoid-schizoid mode) or isolation of the self from lived experience and aliveness of bodily, sensations (collapse in the direction of the depressive mode). Ogden presents his unique development of the autistic-contiguous mode as the synthesis, interpretation, and extension of the works of D. Meltzer, E. Bick, and F. Tustin. He is careful to state that this psychological organization is a developing and ongoing) mode of generating experience and not a limited phase of development; an elaboration of this primitive organization is an integral part of normal development. All three modes are considered not 'positions' to be passed through, outgrown, or overcome, and relegated to the past, but as integral dimensions of present adult ego functioning. Sensory experience in an autistic-contiguous mode has rhythmicity that is becoming the continuity of being; it has boundedness that is the beginning of experience of the place where one feels things and lives; it has features such as shape, hardness, cold, warmth and texture, beginnings of the qualities of who one is. As his generous case examples aptly demonstrate, Ogden's theories are solidly grounded in his discerning work with a broad variety of patients. His brilliant pathfinding will enlighten and enrich the reader with invaluable insights. He will listen with new ears and with a fresh conceptual framework with which to comprehend the most primitive elements of human development and the complex interplay among the different modes of experience. This is a bold, important, instructive, and stimulating book of equally great clinical and theoretical applicability.' —The Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association A Jason Aronson Book |
From inside the book
Results 1-3 of 33
Page 2
... serve as " containers " for the experience of confusion and not knowing . If all is going well in the analytic process , the analysand will inevitably complain that he understands even less at present than he did at the beginning of the ...
... serve as " containers " for the experience of confusion and not knowing . If all is going well in the analytic process , the analysand will inevitably complain that he understands even less at present than he did at the beginning of the ...
Page 38
... serve as a way of resisting my attempts to get inside of her in order - as she perceived it - to control her and turn her into what I needed her to be for me . Mrs. M.'s massaging of her muscles was viewed both as a way of creating a ...
... serve as a way of resisting my attempts to get inside of her in order - as she perceived it - to control her and turn her into what I needed her to be for me . Mrs. M.'s massaging of her muscles was viewed both as a way of creating a ...
Page 104
... served to isolate the patient not only from communication with external objects , but also from a conscious and uncon ... serve as a sensory foundation for the patient's sense of self . The latter is presymbolic ( as opposed to asymbolic ) ...
... served to isolate the patient not only from communication with external objects , but also from a conscious and uncon ... serve as a sensory foundation for the patient's sense of self . The latter is presymbolic ( as opposed to asymbolic ) ...
Contents
The Structure of Experience | 9 |
TransferenceCountertransference | 16 |
Experience in a ParanoidSchizoid Mode | 18 |
Copyright | |
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Common terms and phrases
analysand analysis analytic analytic setting anxiety aspect attempt autistic object autistic shapes autistic-contiguous mode autistic-contiguous position become bodily boundedness castration anxiety chapter child conception conscious constitutes context contiguous mode continuity countertransference created defense depressive mode depressive position described dialectical discussed early ence experienced external Fairbairn fantasy fear felt female Oedipus complex Freud girl's Guntrip idea imitation internal object relations internal object world interplay interpretation involves Klein little boy little girl means mediated Meltzer mode of experience mother and infant mother-infant Oedipal father Oedipal object Ogden omnipotent one's oneself paranoid-schizoid mode paranoid-schizoid position patient penis personality phenomena pre-Oedipal pre-Oedipal mother primal scene phantasy primitive projective identification psychoanalytic psychological organization relatedness rience schizoid second skin sensations sense sensory experience sensory surface sensory-dominated sexual skin space symbol T. S. Eliot talk therapist therapy tion transference transitional Oedipal relationship transitional relationship Tustin uncon unconscious mind understanding understood Winnicott