The white mirror: Face to face with racism in group analysis part 2—mainly practice

My evocative and analytical autoethnography explored the lived experience of diversity during group analytic training and as group analyst. Bakhtin’s dialogism was used to analyse texts. Data analysis has revealed pervasive experiences of racism and discomfort about social class and gender disparity. Religion was not included in my training and achieving feminine autonomy was difficult in group analysis. Linked to patriarchy, colonialism, and perhaps the Holocaust, my analysis suggests that we need to rethink gender and religious certainties. Our morality leaves much to be desired when we do not embrace polyphony, diverse voices. Embracing diversity may also entail discarding the Oedipus Complex. Group analytic training institutes should consider different fee structures so that disadvantaged people can join our elitist circle.

“…When my child was assaulted, GA was silent. This is slowly changing, although GA has still not satisfactorily addressed racism (Aiyegebusi, 2021a).…”

Section: Convergence and Divergence Of Experiencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lived experiences of diversity in group analytic training and as a qualified group analyst: an autoethnographic study

Vosmer¹

2022

“…Sustained action to counter racialized misogyny is much more than a hyper-vigilance of recognition. Given that we are all inevitably implicated in intersectional racist misogyny, it is inevitable that 'systems of segregation, ghettoization or colonization are replicated in analytic groups' (Aiyegbusi, 2021a(Aiyegbusi, , 2021b. The scaffolding that supports group analytic thinking and practices must grapple with the aporetic that emancipatory metanarratives are 'implicated in the narrative it criticizes' (Caselli, 2005: 105).…”

Section: Racist Misogynist Psychic Structuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Racialized misogyny: Response to 44th Foulkes Lecture

Nayak¹

2021

We cannot separate racism from misogyny. The 'intersectional experience [of racial misogyny] is greater than the sum of racism and sexism' (Crenshaw, 1989: 140). Racist misogynist psychic structuresFoulkes' 'Basic Law of Group Dynamics' that there is no clear-cut frontier between inside and outside. (Foulkes, 1990: 184), takes on particular complexity when translated into: racist [misogynist] social structures create racist [misogynist] psychic structures.

“…A survey in 2018 found a relatively small number of articles on race and racism in this journal, Group Analysis. However, more recently the issues of race and racism have been elaborated here, particularly over the last three years: (Kinouani, 2020a and 2020b; Blackwell, 2020a and 2020b; Dalal, 2021; Stevenson, 2021 and 2022; Nayak, 2021; Kent, 2021; Aiyegbusi, 2021a and 2021b; Benjamin and Tucker, 2021; Dizadji F, 2022) and so it might be claimed they are now part of the literature of group analysis. Yet they remain largely ignored and disregarded.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The dialectics of Chat: Privilege, power and institutional racism

Blackwell

2023

The online Large Group promoted by the Group Analytic Society International in response to the Covid 19 lockdown, presented participants with the ‘Chat’ facility alongside the standard verbal communication. Chat rapidly became an alternative channel of communication and a forum for commentary, criticism and challenge to the primary spoken discourse of the group and became a home and a vehicle for disaffected and dissident voices, particularly those marginalized according to race, class and gender. Controversy has developed as various objections have been raised against Chat being allowed in GASi online Large Groups. In so far as Chat has become a place for marginalized and subaltern voices to speak and be ‘heard’, then closing it becomes a praxis of silencing and further institutionalizing racism, patriarchy and class oppression.