The Association for Psychosocial Studies

Lynne Layton on 'Social Psychoanalysis, Normative Unconscious Processes, and an Ethic of Repair.
2024-06-05 14:00 - 15:00 (Europe/London)
We are delighted to invite you to join us for a public lecture by Lynne Layton on ‘Social Psychoanalysis, Normative Unconscious Processes, and an Ethic of Repair. The lecture is part of the seminar series on ‘Decolonising Counselling and Psychotherapy: Reflections from Psychosocial Perspectives’, organised by Nini Kerr, Rhea Gandhi, and Mariya Levitanus, in collaboration with the Association for Psychosocial Studies.

When: Wednesday, 5th June, from 2-3pm.
How: MS Teams – please contact Rhea Gandhi for the link to join the event

Session abstract
This talk takes up the question of what a social psychoanalysis might look like in the clinic, in our psychoanalytic institutions, and in our society. Drawing on some earlier psychoanalysts’ concepts that have connected the social world and the psychic world, I introduce the concept of normative unconscious processes, which addresses the ways that racism, heterosexism, classism and other social inequalities are unconsciously replicated in the clinic. The talk then explores how therapists can resist unconsciously replicating such cultural inequalities. We will then look outside the clinic at how cultural inequalities manifest in the wider circles of contemporary institutional and sociocultural life. Here, too, we will explore how we, as citizens and therapists, both unconsciously replicate and can resist replicating harmful, unequal relations. We will think together about how to address the places in our different subjective and communal worlds where harm has been done, and engage together on how to make repair.

Author bio:
Lynne Layton has a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature and in Clinical Psychology. She is a psychoanalyst and has taught and supervised at the Massachusetts Institute for Psychoanalysis. She is also a Corresponding Member of the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Psychiatry Department at Harvard Medical School. Lynne is the author of Who’s That Girl? Who’s That Boy? Clinical Practice Meets Postmodern Gender Theory, and co-editor of 3 books: Narcissism and the Text: Studies in Literature and the Psychology of Self; Bringing the Plague: Toward a Postmodern Psychoanalysis; and Psychoanalysis, Class and Politics: Encounters in the Clinical Setting. From 2004-2017, she was co-editor of the journal Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society and she is currently an associate editor of Psychoanalytic Dialogues. She is a past-President of Psychoanalysis for Social Responsibility and founded Reflective Spaces/Material Places-Boston, a group of psychodynamic therapists committed to community mental health and social justice. Lynne is on the organizing committee of a national Black-led reparations campaign. She is the author of the 2020 book Toward a Social Psychoanalysis: Culture, Character, and Normative Unconscious Processes, winner of a 2021 book award from the American Academy and Board of Psychoanalysis.

Please contact Rhea Gandhi for the link to join the event.

APS-APCS 2024 Conference
2024-06-17 - 2024-06-18 | St. Mary’s University, Twickenham, Waldegrave Road, London, TW1 4SX, United Kingdom
Psychosocial approaches to researching and experiential learning

A joint conference of the Association for Psychosocial Studies and the Association for the Psychoanalysis of Culture and Society
17th-18th June 2024
St Mary’s University, Twickenham, London TW1 4SX
Conference programme: https://www.conftool.net/aps-apcs-2024/sessions.php
Registration: https://www.conftool.net/aps-apcs-2024/
Registration information: https://www.psychosocial-studies-association.org/registration/
Conference enquiries: conference2024@protonmail.com

Call for papers: Confronting Violence: Exploring the Psychosocial Dynamics of Gender-Based Aggression
2025-01-17 08:00 - 17:00
Call for papers:
Confronting Violence: Exploring the Psychosocial Dynamics of Gender-Based Aggression
Special Edition of The Journal of Psychosocial Studies

The recent report by the National Police Chief’s Council on Violence against Women and Girls has once again highlighted the critical nature of this issue. Declaring the scale of the problem as a national emergency, comparable to terrorism, the report underscores alarming statistics: one in six homicides in England and Wales is linked to domestic abuse, and 20% of all police-recorded crimes—over one million offences annually—are categorized as violence against women and girls. These offences include sexual assault, stalking, harassment, domestic violence, and controlling and coercive behaviour, with the true total estimated to be twice as high.
We believe that psychosocial perspectives are essential for understanding gender-based violence, as it is deeply rooted in social and cultural contexts and lives within the intimate worlds of both perpetrators and victims. We seek articles that engage with the inseparable interplay between psychological and social factors, and offer fresh insights into the complex dynamics that drive these harmful behaviours.
Particular topics that might be included are (for example):

Sexual assault and rape
Stalking
Coercion and control
Institutional misogyny
INCELS
Online abuse and misogyny
Domestic abuse
The impact of abuse and violence
Preventing VAWG
Harassment
Violence in Schools
Policing and VAWG
Intergenerational impacts of abuse and violence

We can publish both formal research papers (that would need to be written in the expected style and sent out for independent review) and open space articles (less formal articles, that might be based on personal experiences and reflection that might take the form of prose, poetry, visual art).
Details are here: https://bristoluniversitypressdigital.com/view/journals/jps/jps-overview.xml?tab_body=instructions-for-authors

Interested contributors should:
Send an abstract of around 500 words to Pete Harris (p00096516@brookes.ac.uk) by Friday 17th January 2025. Please make it clear which type of paper you hope to submit. We are likely to be expecting draft of selected papers to be submitted around November 2025.You will be informed within one month of receipt whether we invite the full submission. Interested contributors are welcome to contact us with queries.

Special Edition Editors

Jane Meyrick – University of West of England (Jane.Meyrick@uwe.ac.uk)
David Gadd – University of Manchester (david.gadd@manchester.ac.uk
Peter Harris – Oxford Brookes University (p00096516@brookes.ac.uk)
David W Jones – The open university (david.jones@open.ac.uk)
Ioanna Gouseti – Oxford Brookes University (p0096557@brookes.ac.uk)
There are more details about the journal here: https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/journals/journal-of-psychosocial-studies

Performing (Post) Pandemic Grief: Prof Fintan Walsh
2025-02-19 16:00 - 17:30
Register here

We are incredibly happy to invite you to join us for our next APS online reading group! We are delighted to welcome Fintan Walsh to present his research on the reckoning with grief in pandemic theatre.
Please join us to learn more about the vital contribution of theatrical performance to the ongoing work of public mourning in the wake of COVID-19.
In advance of the session, please access Prof Walsh’s new book: Performing Grief in Pandemic Theatres. The text is quite short but we especially invite participants to read sections 1, 4 and Coda.
Abstract:
This Element explores how theatre responded to the death and loss produced by the COVID-19 pandemic, by innovating forms and spaces designed to support us in grief. It considers how theatre grieved for itself, for the dead, for lost ways of living, while also imagining and enacting new modes of being together. Even as it reckoned with its own demise, theatre endeavoured to collectivise grief by performing a range of functions more commonly associated with funerary, health and social care services, which buckled under restrictions and neglect. These pandemic theatres show how grief cannot only be let mourn over individual losses in private, but how it must also seep into the public sphere to fight to save critical services, institutions, communities and art forms, including theatre itself.
Author biography:
Fintan Walsh is Professor of Performing Arts and Humanities at Birkbeck, University of London, where is the founding Director of Birbeck Creative Practice Lab and Head of the School of Creative Arts, Culture and Communication. His research focuses on theatre, performance and cross-disciplinary arts practice, with monographs including Performing Grief in Pandemic Theatres (Cambridge University Press, 2024), Performing the Queer Past: Public Possessions (Methuen Drama, 2023), Theatre & Therapy (Methuen Drama, 2013; expanded and reissued 2024), Queer Performance and Contemporary Ireland: Dissent and Disorientation (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), and Male Trouble: Masculinity and the Performance of Crisis (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). Edited volumes include Writing Queer Performance: Contemporary Texts and Documents (Methuen Drama, 2025), Theatres of Contagion: Transmitting Early Modern to Contemporary (Methuen Drama, 2020), That Was Us: Contemporary Irish Theatre and Performance (Oberon Books, 2013), Performance, Identity and the Neo-Political Subject (with Matthew Causey, Routledge, 2013), Queer Notions: New Plays and Performances from Ireland (Cork University Press, 2010), and Crossroads: Performance Studies and Irish Culture (with Sara Brady, Palgrave Macmillan, 2009). Fintan is the founder and Senior Editor of the series Elements in Contemporary Performance Texts (Cambridge University Press) and is a former Senior Editor of the journal Theatre Research International (Cambridge University Press).

Rising Authoritarianism and the Implications for Counselling and Psychotherapy, Friday, 11th April 2025
2025-04-10 10:00 - 13:30
Rising Authoritarianism and the Implications for Counselling and Psychotherapy, Friday, 11th April 2025

We warmly invite students, staff, and the wider therapeutic community to a mini symposium exploring the impact of rising authoritarianism on counselling and psychotherapy. As political landscapes shift globally, we will examine how authoritarian dynamics influence personal and collective psychosocial wellbeing, therapeutic practice, and the profession itself.

Join us for a morning of insightful discussions with leading thinkers in the field by registering here.

Date: Friday, 11th April 2025
Time: 10:00 AM – 1:30 PM
Venue: Hybrid; Mclaren Stuart Room, Old College, University of Edinburgh
Please note: this event is hybrid for accessibility – it is free and open to all. We highly encourage in-person attendance for those in and around Edinburgh.

Symposium Programme

10:00 – 10:10 AM | Opening Remarks by Nini Kerr
10:10 – 10:50 AM | William Kerr – Nationalism and the Global Rise of Authoritarianism
Break
11:00 – 11:40 AM | Susie Orbach – The Seductions and Perils of Authoritarianism
Break
12:00 – 12:40 PM | Barry Richards – Toxic Confusions In and Around Authoritarianism Today
12:40 – 1:10 PM | Small Group Discussion – Rising Authoritarianism and the Implications for Counselling and Psychotherapy
1:10 – 1:30 PM | Final Plenary

This symposium offers a space for critical reflection on the rise of authoritarianism and its implications for therapeutic practice and communities. the role of the therapist and of course, We see our coming together as a political act of engagement in these turbulent times and look forward to your participation in this timely conversation. The symposium is funded by Student Experience Grant

Symposium Convenors: Nini Kerr, Rhea Gandhi, and Jahnavi Dutta
Symposium Anchors: Yaxin Hu (Prof Doc), Beca Sammon (MSc in ICC), Ally Fukada (MSc in CS), Kartika Ladwal (Prof Doc)

If you have any queries regarding registration, please contact Rhea, who is able to advise you: rhea.gandhi@ed.ac.uk

Hope and Despair: Crisis and Opportunity - Annual Conference 2025
2025-06-09 - 2025-06-10 | St. Mary’s University, Twickenham, Waldegrave Road, London, TW1 4SX, United Kingdom

WORLD COMES ALIVE: Virtual Reality and Psychoanalysis
2025-06-19 17:00 - 20:00
World Comes Alive
Experience & discussion of psychoanalytically informed Virtual Reality
Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, London

Thursday 19 June 2025 at 5.00 – 8 pm
(VR experiences by appointment from 3 – 4.30 pm
Book your place here

Event brochure: World Comes Alive Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust Final document-1

APS Conference 2026
2026-06-12 08:00 - 2026-06-13 17:00 | St. Mary’s University, Twickenham, Waldegrave Road, London, TW1 4SX, United Kingdom
