Freud Museum

The issue of ethnicity in France, and how ethnicities are represented there visually, remains one of the most important and polemical aspects of French post-colonial politics and society. This is the first book to analyse how a range of different ethnicities have been represented across contemporary French visual culture. Via a wide series of case studies – from the worldwide hit film Amélie to France’s popular TV series Plus belle la vie – it probes how ethnicities have been represented across different media, including film, photography, television and the visual arts. Four chapters examine distinct areas of particular importance: national identity, people of Algerian heritage, Jewishness and France’s second city Marseille.

ABSTRACT Drawing upon his work with psychotic and disabled patients, the author explores the often shocking and, at times, nauseating ways in which extremely traumatised individuals will communicate through the evacuation of bodily fluids such as mucus, spittle, urine, menstrual blood and, even, semen and faeces. Richly illustrated with several clinical vignettes, the author proposes a four-stage model, outlining the ways in which each psychotherapist must survive his or her countertransferential reaction of stupefaction and then navigate towards a state of toleration. Subsequently, each practitioner must develop the capacity to formulate an interpretation of the unconscious meaning of bodily communication, while, ultimately, working towards an eventual psychological resolution.