AFTER FREUD. International webinar with Jerome Wakefield

Ten years after the publication of our book dedicated to the Gestalt reinterpretation of the Oedipus complex, we are organising an international Webinar entitled “AFTER FREUD. Oedipus: from the law of the father to the law of the relationship”,in which we will discuss with Prof. Jerome Wakefield* of New York University, one of the most authoritative scholars on this subject, and with Prof. Paolo Migone**, editor of the journal Psicoterapia e Scienze Umane, a great connoisseur of Wakefield’s work and of the international debate on this issue.
Representing the GTK Institute will be our director Giovanni Salonia and our scientific advisors Valeria Conte and Antonio Sichera***.

The event is scheduled for Saturday 11 May from 10 a.m. to 12.30 p.m. on ZOOM.

We will compare our research on what we have defined as “the deception of the Oedipus complex” with the outcome of Wakefield’s numerous publications on this same subject, emphasising the convergence of our studies on the dangers of the theories on the Oedipus complex with regard to family relationships and therefore also from the point of view of our vision of clinical intervention in this field. We will consequently propose a shared reflection on the need for a definitive overcoming of this theory, in order to move towards a profound renewal of child psychotherapy and family therapy.

The cost of participation is 30 euros + VAT.You can request registration by filling out the form below and you will receive all the details from our administrative office.

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*Jerome C. Wakefield, PhD, DSW, is University Professor of Social Work and Affiliate Professor of Philosophy at the Center of Bioethics in the School of Global Public Health, Professor of Conceptual Foundations of Psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry (2007-2019), and Honorary Faculty of the Psychoanalytic Association of New York, affiliated with the NYU Grossman School of Medicine, at New York University. He previously held academic appointments at the University of Chicago, Columbia University and Rutgers University.
Dr Wakefield’s clinical training has been highly integrative, ranging from marriage and family therapy to psychoanalysis, and he writes and teaches integrative theory that encompasses multiple clinical perspectives addressing various levels and aspects of the system of significance in people. He serves on the advisory board of SEPI, the Society for the Exploration of Integration in Psychotherapy, and is an elected member of the Rapaport-Klein Study Group on the Psychology of the Ego.
Dr Wakefield is the author of over 300 publications in the fields of philosophy of psychiatry, psychoanalysis and clinical theory, and psychiatric epidemiology, and is the author, co-author or editor of seven books. His book (with A. Horwitz), The Loss of Sadness: How Psychiatry Transformed Normal Sorrow into Depressive Disorder (2007, Oxford), was named best psychology book of 2007 by the American Association of Professional and Scholarly Publishers.
In 2021, MIT Press published a volume, Defining Mental Disorder: Jerome Wakefield and His Critics, containing 13 critical essays by philosophers on his ‘harmful dysfunction’ theory of mental disorder along with 15 complete response essays by Wakefield. More recent books include: A Philosophy of Science Analysis of the Case of Little Hans. (2023, Routledge); Attachment, Sexuality, Power: Oedipal Theory as Regulator of Family Affection in Freud’s Case of Little Hans (2023, Routledge); and Foucault Versus Freud: Oedipal Theory and the Deployment of Sexuality (forthcoming September 2024, Routledge). Recent journal articles include ‘Levels of meaning and the need for psychotherapy integration’ (Clinical Social Work Journal, 48, 236-256); ‘The Promise of Evolutionary Psychiatry’ (World Psychiatry, 2023); and ‘R. Spitzer and the depathologization of homosexuality: Some considerations on the 50^th anniversary’ (forthcoming June 2024, World Psychiatry).

**Paolo Migone has specialised in psychiatry both in Italy and the United States, which is also where he graduated in psychoanalysis. He is co-editor of the journal Psicoterapia e Scienze Umane (www.psicoterapiaescienzeumane.it) and co-chair of the Rapaport-Klein Study Group (Austen Riggs Center, Stockbridge, Massachusetts). Amongst other undertakings, he founded the Italian sections of the Society for Psychotherapy Research (SPR) and the Italian group of the Society for the Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration (SEPI), and is Research Associate of the American Psychoanalytic Association and member of the editorial board of Psychological Issues. He has taught at the Universities of Parma, Bologna, San Raffaele in Milan, Turin and Aosta. He has edited several volumes and is the author of various publications including the books Terapia psicoanalitica (Psychoanalitical Therapy) (FrancoAngeli, 1995, 2010) and La terapia psicodinamica è efficace? Il dibattito e le evidenze empiriche (Is psychodynamic therapy effective? The debate and evidence observed) (FrancoAngeli, 2021).

***Giovanni Salonia. Psychologist, Psychotherapist, Theologian. Already lecturer in Social Psychology at the LUMSA University of Palermo and in Psychology at the Theological Faculty of Palermo. Invited lecturer at the Istituto Teologico San Paolo in Catania. Lecturer at the Pontificia Antonianum University (Rome). Teaches at the School of Specialisation in Psychiatry at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. Has thus far been Visiting Professor at the University of Connecticut (USA). Scientific Responsible for the School of Specialisation in Gestalt Psychotherapy hcc Kairos, Director of the Institute of Gestalt Therapy Kairòs (Venice, Rome, Ragusa) and of postgraduate course for master’s graduates co-managed with the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Rome. Director of the Oasi Cana Family Consultatory in Palermo. Internationally renowned teacher and invited professor at numerous Italian and foreign universities. Full Member of the New York Institute of Gestalt Therapy (NYGT). He was President of FISIG (Italian Federation of Gestalt Schools). Trained in Rogerian Therapy (H. Franta), Family Therapy (M. Kirschenbaum – C. Gammer), Bodytherapy (G. Downing). Graduated in Gestalt Therapy (E. and M. Polster, I. From, J. Zinker). Author of numerous publications, including: Comunicazione Interpersonale (Interpersonal Communication) (with H. Franta), Kairòs, Odòs, Sulla felicità e dintorni (Happiness and its surroundings), Danza delle sedie (Dance in your seat) and danza dei pronomi (Dance of pronouns) and, as co-author, Devo sapere subito se sono vivo (I need to know immediately if I’m alive) and La luna è fatta di formaggio (The moon is made of cheese), I come invidia (E for envy) and La vera storia di Peter Pan (The real story of Peter Pan) on both anthropological and clinical topics. He has also written numerous articles published in foreign and national journals. He founded and directed the journal Quaderni di Gestalt (1985-2002). He founded and has directed Gtk – Rivista Internazionale di Psicoterapia (International Magazine of Psychotherapy) since 2008. He directs the Gtk series of the publishing houses Il Pozzo di Giacobbe and Pensa Multimedia.

Valeria Conte. Psychologist Director at the Psychology Service and Coordinator of the Outpatient
Psychology Clinic at the
Modica branch of the Provincial ASP of Ragusa; Psychotherapist and Teacher – Ordinary Supervisor recognised by the Italian Federation of Gestalt
Schools and Institutes. Member of the Scientific Committee and Didactic and Clinical Director of the School of Specialisation in Gestalt Psychotherapy, recognised by the Italian Ministry of Education with Ministerial Decree 9.5.94, with premises in Rome, Venice and Ragusa. Member of the Scientific Committee of the international on-line journal GTK. She trained with the major national and international exponents of Gestalt Psychotherapy and completed her training in family therapy and body therapy. She has deepened the epistemological model of Gestalt Therapy in her work with psychiatric patients and in her work with couples and families.

Antonio Sichera. Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary Italian Literature at the Department of Humanities of the University of Catania and lecturer in Phenomenology and Hermeneutics at the Postgraduate School of the Gestalt Therapy Kairos Institute. Trained in Lexicography and Semantics of European Literary Language at the prestigious school of Giuseppe Savoca in Catania, he has written essays and monographs on Foscolo, Pasolini, Pavese, Pirandello, Montale, Quasimodo and many other authors of contemporary literature, from an interdisciplinary and hermeneutic perspective. He has dealt on several occasions with the theory of criticism and literary acting, in relation to philosophical and theological knowledge, between Gadamer, Benjamin and Jossua. On the clinical side, he is the author of several essays on the hermeneutic and aesthetic aspects of Gestalt Therapy.