Localization and its discontents : a genealogy of psychoanalysis and the neuro disciplines

Psychoanalysis and neurological medicine have promoted contrasting and seemingly irreconcilable notions of the modern self. Since Freud, psychoanalysts have relied on the spoken word in a therapeutic practice that has revolutionized our understanding of the mind. Neurologists and neurosurgeons, meanwhile, have used material apparatus—the scalpel, the electrode—to probe the workings of the nervous system, and in so doing have radically reshaped our understanding of the brain. Both operate in vastly different institutional and cultural contexts. Given these differences, it is remarkable that both fields found resources for their development in the same tradition of late nineteenth-century German medicine: neuropsychiatry. In __Localization and Its Discontents__, Katja Guenther investigates the significance of this common history, drawing on extensive archival research in seven countries, institutional analysis, and close examination of the practical conditions of scientific and clinical work. Her remarkable accomplishment not only reframes the history of psychoanalysis and the neuro disciplines, but also offers us new ways of thinking about their future. Localization and Its Discontents provides a historical approach to the relationship between the “psy” and “neuro” disciplines, in particular psychoanalysis and neurology. Despite their opposition, they both trace intellectual and practical roots back to the same “neuropsychiatry” ( Hirnpsychiatrie ) that was dominant in the German-speaking world in the late nineteenth century. This book investigates and elaborates the significance of this historical connection, drawing on extensive archival research, institutional analysis, and close examination of the practical conditions of scientific and clinical work. The analysis of the relationship between neurology and psychoanalysis is guided by their common engagement with the principles of localization and what is best termed “connectivity”—principles of major importance in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century medicine. Both neurology and psychoanalysis developed their respective practices by using connective principles to criticize the localization of function. This historical investigation not only reframes the relationship between psychoanalysis and the “neuro” disciplines, providing resources for thinking about how they developed as independent fields, and shedding new light on their theory and practice. It also offers a new perspective on the contemporary brain sciences. I argue that recent developments in neuroscience can be read as a re-articulation of the relationship between localization and connectivity. An understanding of this new articulation helps reframe anxieties about the place of neuroscience in contemporary academic culture, and in particular in the humanities "Psychoanalysis and neurological medicine have promoted contrasting and seemingly irreconcilable notions of the modern self. Since Freud, psychoanalysts have relied on the spoken word in a therapeutic practice that has revolutionized our understanding of the mind. Neurologists and neurosurgeons, meanwhile, have used material apparatus--the scalpel, the electrode--to probe the workings of the nervous system, and in so doing have radically reshaped our understanding of the brain. Both operate in vastly different institutional and cultural contexts. Given these differences, it is remarkable that both fields found resources for their development in the same tradition of late nineteenth-century German medicine: neuropsychiatry. In Localization and Its Discontents, Katja Guenther investigates the significance of this common history, drawing on extensive archival research in seven countries, institutional analysis, and close examination of the practical conditions of scientific and clinical work. Her remarkable accomplishment not only reframes the history of psychoanalysis and the neuro disciplines, but also offers us new ways of thinking about their future."--Provided by publisher