Post Kleinian

a degree of convergence between the attachment and neo-Kleinian approaches. Bion (1978) saw the capacity of the mother to hold and ‘detoxify’ her infants’ negative affect, and eventually to put unhappiness and mental pain into words as a vital stepping stone

This passage argues that despite Bowlby’s hostility to Kleinian orthodoxy, the Post Kleinian (neo-Kleinian) elaboration of maternal containment in Bion converges with attachment theory’s emphasis on parental sensitivity and affect regulation.

Bowlby, John, John Bowlby and Attachment Theory (Makers of Modern, 2014thesis

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Fordham notes that a good deal of interaction with psychoanalysts took place and that ‘in particular the Kleinian school, with its

This passage argues that the London Developmental School of post-Jungians constituted itself partly through formative engagement with the Kleinian school, making Post Kleinian thought a direct shaping force on Jungian clinical identity.

Samuels, Andrew, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985thesis

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It is Klein’s notion of unconscious fantasy, however, that is the psychoanalytic idea most closely aligned with archetypal theory… internal objects must have an archetypal component, they also derive from the external world and hence they are not structures

This passage argues that while Kleinian internal objects and Jungian archetypes are frequently conflated, they represent fundamentally distinct metaphysical claims — a distinction that remains consequential for Post Kleinian and post-Jungian comparative theory.

Samuels, Andrew, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985supporting

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the Kleinian approach is essentially a mythological one… Klein stopped using the ‘scientific’ world view promulgated by Freud and simply started telling stories about the inner life of children

This passage argues that Klein’s break from Freudian scientism — formative for the Post Kleinian tradition — was essentially a move toward mythological and narrative modes of understanding inner experience.

Samuels, Andrew, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985supporting

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Any so-called ‘science’ of the mind which did not take account of the inner world of phantasy, they claimed, was worthless and had no place within psychoanalytic discourse

This passage traces the epistemological fault line that separates Bowlby’s empiricism from the Kleinian and Post Kleinian insistence that unconscious phantasy constitutes an irreducible and non-negotiable domain of psychoanalytic inquiry.

Bowlby, John, John Bowlby and Attachment Theory (Makers of Modern, 2014supporting

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post-Jungian self-psychology and psychoanalytic self-psychology creatively cross-fertilise… the work of three major psychoanalytic theorists: Kohut, Winnicott and Bion

This passage positions Bion and Winnicott — central figures of the Post Kleinian tradition — as productive interlocutors for post-Jungian self-psychology, illustrating the cross-theoretical fecundity of Post Kleinian ideas.

Samuels, Andrew, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985supporting

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He has also made emotional progress in terms of concern for others and the development of a rudimentary conscience… nothing more is required than ordinary good mothering

This passage, describing Fordham’s developmental schema, draws implicitly on Post Kleinian conceptual vocabulary — concern for others, conscience, good-enough mothering — without naming it as such.

Samuels, Andrew, Jung and the Post-Jungians, 1985aside

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