This article is an invitation to read M. Benyamin’s book, Le travail du préconscient à l’épreuve de l’adolescence (Preconscious work challenged by adolescence). It will present the major axes of Benyamin’s thinking that give the clinician an original and captivating insight into the preconscious, as well as the psychosomatic and psychoanalysis of the adolescent.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 191-197.
The author focuses on the polemic about the dangers of NTIC for the mental heath of adolescents. It argues that the defenders of NTIC are characterized by a disavowal of the problem of their overuse and the importance of links between human beings, by a dubious assertion of their value as self-therapy, and by an improper use of psychoanalytical concepts. He associates this attitude with a lack of tolerance for internal and external alterity, a feature of our modern life that is fostered by the virtualization of experience.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 179-189.
Through an analysis of the Pina Bausch’s show Kontakthof with adolescents over the age of fourteen, we explore the body, desire, castration, dream and identification in adolescence. We will see how a group can come together not on the basis of a protective ideal, but rather on the impetus of desire. This desire relates to dreaming and playing and manifests itself in dancing.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 167-176.
This article offers some insights about the establishment of a novel treatment setting for obese girls, which uses the mediation of the body and in which both individual and group issues were played out. This holistic approach combining the somatic and the psychic, emphasizes the way the group supports the containment function in these girls who present an unconscious image of a disordered body.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 151-166.
Aesthetic emotion arises in an individual at the particular moment when he or she is captivated by the unique beauty of a work of art, by a shape or a word that reveals a deeply intimate yet universal truth. Such rare and precious moments open up a space for playing and creativity in the monotony of existence or in pathological repetition. We will attempt to study the context of two moments of aesthetic emotion we observed in an art therapy workshop for adolescents hospitalized full-time.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 139-149.
Group work using mediations can help with symbolization in the treatment of vulnerable adolescents. As with psychodrama, the “found/created” group setting – in this case made up of adolescents from a therapeutic group home – supported by narrativity (maps, fantastic stories, illustrated and shared storytelling) can mobilize an inter-fantasizing dynamic, thus undoing the violence of incorporated traumatic experiences that can stagger the adolescent process.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 129-138.
This article analyzes the therapeutic “site” of theatrical mediation. The group occupies a central place within it, though differs from the therapeutic setting of group analytic psychodrama. The characteristics of the medium of theater use a specific dynamic. This becomes a catalyst for the phoric function. Aesthetic harmonizing offers opportunities for dis-identification.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 117-128.
Starting with an analysis of a psychodrama session involving adolescents who attack and avoid intersubjective links, we were able to determine that the problematic of intrusion is transferred topically and temporally on and into the treatment setting in the manner of phobio-social transference.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 101-116.
The structure of psychoanalytic group therapy (PGT) entails an anamorphic relationship with that of the dream’s transformative work. The dream and the group are two subjective and societal constants. The author emphasizes the links of figurabilty between primal scenality, dream scenality, adolescent scenality and psychodramatic scenality. He analyzes their involvement in the symbolic effectiveness of the PGT setting with adolescents, especially borderline adolescents.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 83-100.
Using the model of the institution-as-group, this article points out a transformative process affecting individual and group psychic envelopes. The contingencies of the gradual internalization of the setting remind us that for some adolescents the work of differentiating borders and re-establishing a skin around thoughts must come before any focus on repressed content. The group’s self-reorganizing abilities support these changes.
Adolescence, 2016, 34, 1, 65-82.