Events and Seminars

David Bell & Aleksandra Novakovic.

'Living on the Border: Psychotic Processes in the Individual, the Couple and the Group'

This book centres on the problem of psychosis, understood from a psychoanalytic perspective, as it manifests itself in different settings: the individual psychoanalytic session, work with couples, groups and institutions and also wider levels of social organisation. Beginning with a discussion of the psychoanalytic approach to psychosis centering on the work of Freud, Klein and the Post-Kleinians, it goes on to explore these various contexts.

This work is aimed at professionals working within the psychodynamic frame of reference such as individual psychotherapists, couple and family and group psychotherapists; organisational consultants and trainees . It will also be a useful resource to nurses, doctors and social workers who work with very disturbed patients.

David Bell is a Consultant Psychiatrist at the Tavistock Clinic, where he directs the Fitzjohn’s Unit, a specialist service for seri­ous/complex psychological disorders. He is visiting Professorial Fellow, Birkbeck College, London and past President of the British Psychoanalytical Society. Throughout his career he has been deeply involved in the relation between psychoanalysis and literature, philosophy, and politics, and he has made numerous contributions in these areas. He is the UK’s leading psychiatric expert in asylum/human rights. He is contributing editor of Reason and Passion (1997) and Psychoanalysis and Culture: A Kleinian Perspective (1999, revised edition 2004) and the author of Paranoia (2002).

Aleksandra Novakovic is a group analyst and psychoanalyst and is a member of the London Institute of Group Analysis and the British Psychoanalytic Association. She was Joint Head of the Inpatient & Community Psychology Service, Barnet, Enfield & Haringey Mental Health Trust. She worked with patients with severe and complex mental health problems and facilitated staff groups for inpatient and community mental health staff teams. She is currently working in the Complex Care Services, St Ann’s Hospital, and is a Visiting Clinical Lecturer at the Tavistock Centre for Couple Relationships.