Who gives back the voice of the patient? A critic of the Freudian therapeutic attitude through the work of Sándor Ferenczi
Who gives back the voice of the patient? A critic of the Freudian therapeutic attitude through the work of Sándor Ferenczi

Summary/Abstract: The present article lays out the difference between two psychotherapeutic paradigms: one silencing mental patients, the other one intending to give them back their voice. According to Foucault, medicine from the17th century gradually breaks the dialogue between madness and normality and the language of psychiatry becomes the monologue of the reason. Freudian psychoanalysis was the first attempt to break this silence. Freud’s communicative therapy brought back madness to the field of discourse and showed the possibility of dialogue with abnormality. In many case studies, however, Freud authoritatively pushes his own understanding over his patients. Psychoanalysis seems liberative;however, there is a perceptible tension between the Freudian theory and the practice. I used Sándor Ferenczi’s oeuvre to propose a synthesis of the original Freudian intention and the analyst's hierarchical position in practice. He also focused on the communicative potential of the therapy, but he experimented more broadly to find the most suitable form of doctor-patient relationship. Hence,Ferenczi’s oeuvre opens up alternative therapeutic attitudes and allows a more nuanced implementation of Freud’s original thoughts.

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