Clara Thompson

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Clara Mabel Thompson (born October 3, 1893 in Providence , Rhode Island , † December 20, 1958 ) was an American doctor , psychoanalyst and psychotherapist . She is considered a representative of neo-psychoanalysis .

biography

The meeting that was decisive for her career was made by Clara Thompson in 1917, one year after starting her clinical training at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore : She met Lucille Dooley , a student at Granville Stanley Hall , who had already had psychological questions with Freud , Jung and Adolf Meyer in 1910 could discuss. In 1918, she met William Alanson White and Edward Kempf of St. Elizabeth's Hospital in Washington, DC , who recommended that their students use psychoanalytic concepts in their work with psychiatric patients.

After graduating from Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore in 1920 , Clara Thompson decided to specialize in psychiatry . In 1922 she began a three-year psychiatric training with Adolf Meyer at the Johns Hopkins Clinic . In 1923 she met Harry Stack Sullivan , whose new approaches to the therapeutic treatment of schizophrenia interested her. In 1930 Thompson was elected president of the New Psychoanalytic Association of Washington and Baltimore.

From 1931 to 1933 Thompson underwent a training analysis with Sandor Ferenczi in Budapest , in whose psychoanalytic theory and technique, which emphasized the interpersonal element, the seeds of neo-psychoanalysis were already laid out. After Ferenczi's death, Thompson returned to the New York Psychoanalytic Institute in 1933, where she resumed contact with Sullivan and Silverberg and met Karen Horney and Erich Fromm . The whole group ( Zodiac Club ) met every Monday to study Sullivan's concept of interpersonal psychiatry .

After a controversy between supporters of traditional libido theory and those who emphasized social processes as the basis of personality formation , the “five rebels” (Horney, Thompson, Robbins, Ephron, Kelman) left the New York Institute and founded The American Association for the in 1941 Advancement of Psychoanalysis . But here too there were arguments, this time between Horney and Fromm. This led to the founding of the William Alanson White Institute in New York City in 1943 by Thompson and Fromm. Clara Thompson led this institute for 15 years in a liberal, scientific style, combining psychoanalytic concepts with anthropology and social psychology .

plant

Thompson's life and work served the purpose of teaching and spreading psychology. She held innumerable lectures on the latest state of knowledge in psychology and psychotherapy and organized roundtables to deal with psychological issues. She critically analyzed the development of psychoanalysis, highlighting progressive paths and pointing out those that led to a dead end. Although Thompson did not add a new theory of her own, she made a significant contribution to the neo-psychoanalytic movement as a psychotherapist and doctor, as a training analyst and lecturer, as the founder and director of the William Alanson White Institute, and as the author of countless publications.

swell

  1. ^ [1] Biography of Clara M. Thompson
  2. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from June 16, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Biography Clara M. Thompson, webster.edu  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.webster.edu
  3. ↑ The William Alanson White Institute Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow ( Memento of the original from May 17, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.wawhite.org

literature

  • Clara M. Thompson (1950). Psychoanalysis: Evolution and Development . Thomas Nelson & Sons. New York 1950
  • Clara Thompson, The Psychoanalysis: Your Origin and Development , Dt. First edition by Pan-Verlag, Zurich 1952, ISBN 3-85999-011-X
  • Clara M. Thompson, Towards a psychology of women . Pastoral Psychology, 4 (34), 29-38, 1953
  • Clara M. Thompson, The different schools of psychoanalysis . American Journal of Nursing, 57, 1304-1307, 1957.
  • Maurice R. Green (Ed.). Interpersonal psychoanalysis : The selected papers of Clara M. Thompson. New York: Basic Books Inc., New York 1964
  • Ruth Moulton, Clara Thompson: Unassuming leader . In L. Dickstein and C. Nadelson (Eds.), Women physicians in leadership roles. American Psychiatric Press, Washington DC 1986.
  • Sue A. Shapiro, Clara Thompson, Ferenczi's messenger with half a message . In L. Aron and A. Harris (Eds.), Legacy of Sándor Ferenczi .: Analytic Press, Hillsdale, NJ, and London 1993

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Thompson, Clara
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Thompson, Clara M .; Thompson, Clara Mabel
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American doctor, psychoanalyst and psychotherapist
DATE OF BIRTH October 3, 1893
PLACE OF BIRTH Providence , Rhode Island
DATE OF DEATH December 20, 1958