Author: Arnold D. Richards

From Nuremberg to Guantánamo by Nancy Sherman
By Categories: Controversial

As someone who has visited Guantanamo with the former presidents of the American Psychological and the American Psychiatric Associations (in Oct. 2005), the American Psychiatric has been from the beginning adamant in its belief that psychiatrists should not be involved in interrogations that are coercive. Compare the following statements. The American Psychological Association, issued a report in July, 2005 stating that psychologists consulting in interrogation involving national security should be “mindful of factors unique to these roles and contexts that require ethical consideration.” ( This is fairly permissive.) The American Psychiatric Association, in its statement of the same time, is more restrictive in its guidelines. Members can serve as behavior consultants so long as there is no “coercive” element to the interrogation. See Neil Lewis, “Guantanamo Tour Focuses on Medical Ethics,” New York Times, Sunday, November, 13, 2005, A19. These are old statements. I believe they have been updated, but they give you a sense of the difference, early on in the debate. I have written on this in a number of pieces, including a piece that just appeared in DISSENT, Winter issue. Continue reading From Nuremberg to Guantánamo by Nancy Sherman

Symonds Prize at Studies in Gender and Sexuality: Winner and New Contest
By Categories: Announcements

Symonds Prize at Studies in Gender and Sexuality: Winner and New Contest
The Editors of Studies in Gender and Sexuality proudly announce the winner of the first Symonds Prize: Meg Jay, PhD, “Melancholy Femininity and Obsessive-Compulsive Masculinity: Sex Differences in Melancholy Gender,” Vol. 8, # 2 (2007).

They also announce the second annual competition for the best essay on a topic related to issues of gender, sexuality, or both. The essay may engage clinical or theoretical questions. The writer may be new or seasoned. The topic may be cutting-edge or devoted to any of the time-honored problems in psychoanalysis. Examples of topics include but are not limited to:

Gender in the work place, everyday life, and politics

Sex and gender in clinic and in culture

Gender and sex in contemporary cinema or theater, literature or art

Sex and food

Gay marriage and civil union

Race and gender in clinical and cultural representation

The materiality of sex: from sex toys to who does what with whom

Seduction and consent

Gender and sexuality in disability or illness

Gender and prisons

A cultural studies approach to pornography

A cultural studies approach to recent television (“The Real World,” “The L Word”…)

Torture, war crimes, and gender (Abu Ghraib, Rwanda…)

Gender, sexuality and the history of psychoanalysis

Abortion politics and rights

In the spirit of the journal’s mandate, we are interested in essays that vary in form and content. Submission could include papers that are multidisciplinary. We are open to orthodoxy and heterodoxy. Even to their combinations.

The contest will be judged by members of the journal’s Editorial Board. The winner of the Symonds Prize will receive $500, and the essay will be published in the journal.

Now in its seventh year of publication, SGS ( http://www.analyticpress.com/sgs.html) has served as an interdisciplinary forum for reexamining gender and sexuality. It was launched with paradigm-stretching articles on male and female homosexuality and bisexuality; femininity and the place of desire; postmodern gender theory; and the erotic transference. Since then, SGS has been at the leading edge of sex and gender theory. It has explored many clinical, developmental, and cultural topics – boyhood homophobia; bisexuality; infertility; gender jokes, transsexual and transgender categories of identity and experience – and ranged into the visual arts, cinema, and popular culture.

Submissions (title page to list author’s name and contact info; manuscript to list only title on first page and as running head) should be sent to:

Martha Hadley, Ph.D.

Executive Editor

Is this the end of the scholarly journal? Article in Christian Science Monitor
By Categories: Controversial

Is this the end of the scholarly journal?

Publishing research to blogs and e-books is so easy, some are wondering if peer-reviewed journals are on their way to obsolescence.

Click Here: Gregory M. Lamb | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

This article raises a question about the future of print peer reviewed scientific journals. My sense is that there will be a place for quality peer reviewed journals in psychoanalysis.

Proust and the Love of Longing by Arlene Kramer Richards and Lucille Spira
By Categories: In Progress

Chick here for: Arlene Kramer Richards and Lucille Sprira on Proust and the Love of Longing

This work in progress is an attempt to learn something from a great artist
and commentator on human nature that will be applicable to clinical work
with analytic patients. We would be especially glad to hear from readers
how the ideas about loneliness and aloneness being valued over fulfillment
accord with their clinical observations. Case vignettes would be especially
welcome.    Arlene