This book offers a radical alternative to the positive orientation of popular psychology. This positive orientation has been criticized numerous times. However, there has yet to be a coherent alternative proposed. We all know today that life hurts and that there is no ultimate remedy to this pain. The positive approach feels to us as dishonest and irrelevant. We require a new, more negative, perspective and practice, one that is honest and does not pretend to offer an escape from the agonies of the world. This book offers in three main chapters a ‘depressive realist’ perspective that explores the structural role of negativity and tragedy in relation to the individual psyche, society, and nature. It explores the possibility of ‘negative psychoanalysis’ which takes into account the tragedy of human existence instead of adopting escapist positions.
Author(s): Julie Reshe
Edition: 1
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 149
City: London
About the Book
Contents
About the Author
Chapter 1: Introduction: Welcome to Hell
References
Chapter 2: The Living Dead: Destructive Plasticity
The Unfixable Ones
Limitations of Freud’s Trauma Theory
The Formative Power of Destruction
Destructive Plasticity
Destructive Plasticity in Neuroscience
ŽiŽek’s Response
Troubles de Jouissance
Destructive Plasticity as the Only Plasticity
In the Long Run, We Are All Dead
References
Chapter 3: Destructive Plasticity, War, and Anarchism: A Conversation Between Catherine Malabou and Julie Reshe
Chapter 4: Dead Together: Love Hurts
Bracketing Enjoyment Out
The Death-Driven Society
The Negative Dialectics of the Individual and Society
Negative Social Cognitive Neuroscience
The Negative and the Political
The Negative Project of Psychoanalysis
References
Chapter 5: The Death Drive, Politics, and Love: A Conversation Between Todd McGowan and Julie Reshe
Chapter 6: A Tragic Fairy Tale of Evolution: Zupančič, Zapffe, and Other Monsters
Aborted Monsters: Zupančič on Nietzsche and Lacan
Chaos Sive Natura
Zapffe: The Shared Tragedy of Everything Alive
Hopeless Monstrosity of Evolution
More Monstrosity: Viruses and Chimeras
References
Chapter 7: Human Animal, Positive Psychology, and Trauma: A Conversation Between Alenka Zupančič and Julie Reshe
Chapter 8: Epilogue: No Salvation
Individual Dimension
Social Dimension
Nature
Negative Practice
Index
