seminari uni bergamo [Centro di Studi Storici Transdisciplinari ISHTAR]

Judith Butler: A streetcar named desire

In Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire Blanche Dubois describes her journey: "They told me to take a street-car named Desire, and then transfer to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at Elysian Fields!"'· When she hears that her present dismal location is Elysian Fields, she is sure that the directions she received were wrong.
Her predicament is implicitly philosophical. What kind of journey is desire that its direction is so deceptive? And what kind of vehicle is desire? And does it have other stops before it reaches its mortal destination? This inquiry follows one journey of desire, the travels of a desiring subject who remains nameless and genderless in its abstract universality. We would not be able to recognize this subject in the train station; it cannot be said to exist as an individual. As an abstract structure of human longing, this subject is a conceptual configuration of human agency and purpose whose claim to ontological integrity is successively challenged throughout its travels. Indeed, like Blanche and her journey, the desiring subject follows a narrative of desire, illusion, and defeat, relying on occasional moments of recognition as a source of temporary redemptions.

[Judith Butler, 'Subjects of desire. Hegelian Reflections in Twentieth-Century France', 1987. Preface]

The past is dead, the DDR is dead (a picture from 1972)

http://www.bild.de/politik/inland/angela-merkel/merkel-bei-ddr-zivilschutzuebung-30471902.bild.html

EINE DDR-ZIVILSCHUTZÜBUNG IM JAHR 1972"Diese junge Frau in Uniform (Angela Merkel, 17 jahren alt) ist heute ihre Kanzlerin":The past is dead, the DDR is dead

William S. Burroughs: "We walked many hours"

We walked many hours and it was dawn when we came to a clearing where I could see a number of workers with sharp sticks and gourds of seed planting corn—The boy touched my shoulder and disappeared up the path in jungle dawn mist—

As I stepped forward into the clearing and addressed one of the workers, I felt the crushing weight of evil insect control forcing my thoughts and feelings into prearranged molds, squeezing my spirit in a soft invisible vise—The worker looked at me with dead eyes empty of curiosity or welcome and silently handed me a planting stick—It was not unusual for strangers to wander in out of the jungle since the whole area was ravaged by soil exhaustion—So my presence occasioned no comment—I worked until sundown—I was assigned to a hut by an overseer who carried a carved stick and wore an elaborate headdress indicating his rank—I lay down in the hammock and immediately felt stabbing probes of telepathic interrogation—I turned on the thoughts of a halfwitted young Indian—After some hours the invisible presence withdrew—I had passed the first test

—

During the months that followed I worked in the fields—The monotony of this existence made my disguise as a mental defective quite easy—I learned that one could be transferred from field work to rock carving the stellae after a long apprenticeship and only after the priests were satisfied that any thought of resistance was forever extinguished—I decided to retain the anonymous status of a field worker and keep as far as possible out of notice—

A continuous round of festivals occupied our evenings and holidays—On these occasions the priests appeared in elaborate costumes, often disguised as centipedes or lobsters—Sacrifices were rare, but I witnessed one revolting ceremony in which a young captive was tied to a stake and the priests tore his sex off with white-hot copper claws—I learned also something of the horrible punishments meted out to anyone who dared challenge or even think of challenging the controllers: Death in the Ovens: The violator was placed in a construction of interlocking copper grills—The grills were then heated to white heat and slowly closed on his body. Death In Centipede: The "criminal" was strapped to a couch and eaten alive by giant centipedes—These executions were carried out secretly in rooms under the temple.

I made recordings of the festivals and the continuous music like a shrill insect frequency that followed the workers all day in the fields—However, I knew that to play these recordings would invite immediate detection—I needed not only the sound track of control but the image track as well before I could take definitive action—I have explained that the Mayan control system depends on the calendar and the codices which contain symbols representing all states of thought and feeling possible to human animals living under such limited circumstances—These are the instruments with which they rotate and control units of thought—I found out also that the priests themselves do not understand exactly how the system works and that I undoubtedly knew more about it than they did as a result of my intensive training and studies—The technicians who had devised the control system had died out and the present line of priests were in the position of some one who knows what buttons to push in order to set a machine in motion, but would have no idea how to fix that machine if it broke down, or to construct another if the machine were destroyed-

(http://www.rudyrucker.com/blog/2009/04/13/filoli-the-soft-machine/)

Paul Verlaine: "BEAMS" [: Rimbaud, écrite sur le navire pour l'Angleterre]

Rimbaud, much later

Beams

Elle voulut aller sur les bords de la mer,
Et comme un vent bénin soufflait une embellie,
Nous nous prêtâmes tous à sa belle folie,
Et nous voilà marchant par le chemin amer.

Le soleil luisait haut dans le ciel calme et lisse,
Et dans ses cheveux blonds c'étaient des rayons d'or,
Si bien que nous suivions son pas plus calme encor
Que le déroulement des vagues, ô délice !

Des oiseaux blancs volaient alentour mollement
Et des voiles au loin s'inclinaient toutes blanches.
Parfois de grands varechs filaient en longues branches,
Nos pieds glissaient d'un pur et large mouvement.

Elle se retourna, doucement inquiète
De ne nous croire pas pleinement rassurés,
Mais nous voyant joyeux d'être ses préférés,
Elle reprit sa route et portait haut la tête.

LINK/ Zhang Zhilong: "Who do psychiatrists turn to when they need therapy?" [Global Times | 2013-5-13,

http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/781244.shtml#.UZd8QpU_bGA


Every so often, Zhou Haisong feels that she is weighed down by negative feelings and depression. 

"I'm really frustrated, and don't know what to do sometimes. I don't make any progress on my cases, and I am close to being in self-denial," Zhou told the Global Times in a telephone interview.

Whenever she feels like this, Zhou knows it's time for her to turn to psychiatric experts for help. 

But Zhou is not any ordinary patient seeking therapy: she herself is a psychiatrist.

She believes her negative emotions are transferred from people who have come to her for psychiatric help, or "visitors," as the professionals prefer to call them.

Zhou has been working in this field for three years, and believes she has been driven to seek help because of the nature of her job. 

Turning to colleagues for help

But who do psychiatrists turn to when they find themselves in need of therapy? Psychiatrists can attend lectures or talk to other professionals in their field to try and solve their problems, according to Ou Yongling, a psychiatry supervisor, who works at a psychological education center under the Beijing Normal University Education Training Center.

Visiting senior psychiatrists is an effective choice, but for Zhou, a supervisor doesn't need to be someone who's more experienced than her.

"In a specific period, as long as this psychiatrist can understand me and tolerate me, he or she would make a perfect supervisor," she told the Global Times.

"I need different 'supervisors' in different stages," said Zhou, adding that some supervisors can be helpful in one stage, but not in the next. 

Psychiatrists can find their supervisors by visiting them after a lecture or being introduced by colleagues. "When you really need a supervisor, someone will be there," said Zhou.

Lin Ye (pseudonym), 40, has been a psychiatrist for over 10 years and offers advice to both ordinary visitors and colleagues. Some of his visitors are students at a major university in Beijing.

"Trying to be less exposed or not exposed to the public is a requirement for this job," said Lin, explaining that too much exposure could have a negative impact on the relationship between psychiatrists and visitors.

For Lin, every psychiatrist needs to be supervised by other professionals. 

"A psychiatrist's job is quite subjective, and sometimes when we talk to visitors, another psychiatrist must be present. This psychiatrist plays the role of supervisor, and his level is irrelevant. This is quite necessary," explained Lin to the Global Times.

However, experienced psychiatrists can offer more suggestions to novices than their peers, he added.

In their job, psychiatrists need a great deal of experience to help visitors with serious problems, while currently in China, most professionals have only been in the job for a short time, said Ou.

When they come across difficult problems, psychiatrists must turn to supervisors for help. But the number of experienced supervisors is limited, and the cost is very high, said Ou.

Commonly, a small team of eight to 10 psychiatrists is set up to counsel fellow professionals in need of help. They share experiences based on previous cases and offer suggestions to each other.

Bigger classes are also held, where psychiatrists attend training sessions for a whole day. In the morning, experienced supervisors share knowledge of psychotherapy and in the afternoon they discuss cases.

"This helps solve the predicament of not having enough supervisors," said Ou.

Where problems arise

Common symptoms experienced by psychiatrists are depression or feelings of rage. Zhou Haisong says this is because psychiatrists use themselves as a tool to work, talk with visitors, analyze their problems, and finally solve them.

"There are no techniques or academic schools that are there for us to use when we deal with specific cases.  We only have ourselves," said Zhou. 

In order to cure visitors, an emotional relationship first needs to be built between psychiatrists and visitors. After that, trust can be established, and visitors will then practice the proper form of communication between psychiatrists and themselves, which visitors use with colleagues, family members or friends. This is how empathy occurs, and is essential for psychotherapy.

"The form visitors take usually has problems, and it's why visitors need help from psychiatrists," explained Ou.

Under most circumstances, the form of communication which visitors use gets them into various kinds of conflict. They are either mocked or even verbally abused in daily life. But in the therapy room a psychiatrist must try to stand with the visitors and tolerate their defensive tendency or even verbal abuse. 

"This is partly where psychiatrists' negative emotions come from," she said.

After a period of time, psychiatrists analyze what's wrong with visitors, and gradually lead them onto a healthy path.

"But the precondition is that psychiatrists should be tolerant and able to control the situation," said Ou. 

However, when they come face to face with these visitors, some psychiatrists feel helpless, and that's when the transference of negative emotions occurs.

Psychiatrists may become impatient, intolerant, and even argue with visitors. "The obvious symptom is that psychiatrists don't want their visitors to come any more, even though they won't say this out loud," said Ou, adding that this marks the end of the relationship.

An accumulation of failed experiences will also lead to psychiatrists becoming exhausted. "They feel they have lost the ability to care about others, and they feel 'burnt out' in their career," she said. 

The breakup of a psychiatrist-visitor relationship is a form of failure, but is an inevitable one for most psychiatrists. Being too emotional toward visitors is also seen as a failure, because it does nothing to help solve or even detect a visitor's problems.

Besides these failures, psychiatrists also develop their professional abilities through repeated practice and their own observations. They also need to study constantly to improve their professional abilities.

Psychiatrists' confidence can also be undermined by people who don't believe visiting them will work, or conversely, who think that psychiatrists can help solve all their problems, said Ou. 

In the end, only visitors themselves can fully solve their problems, and the same is true for psychiatrists, she added. 

Being tolerant, both to visitors and to themselves, is an essential quality for psychiatrists. A good psychiatrist won't give visitors the impression he knows everything and can solve every difficulty. 

"Acknowledging they don't know something, frankly and naturally, works much better than knowing all and is beneficial to visitors," said Ou.

Value of experience

Lin calls himself a psychiatric supervisor, but admits that he is not recognized as one according to the newly released Mental Health Law, since he does not meet certain criteria.

Under the law, psychiatrist supervisors can only become certified after meeting certain standards which list clearly how many cases they have had as supervisors to other psychiatrists, how many hours of training they have received, and how many times they themselves have been supervised by others.

Besides "curing" visitors, psychiatrists need to further study and carry out research. They also need to constantly work with each other to obtain a deeper understanding of themselves, which is essential to developing their abilities.

"When it comes to handling individual cases, it's what we've realized through talking to each other that helps us work," Zhou said, adding that she does this once a week.

She also attends three academic groups every week. In one group, psychiatrists with the same level of experience work as supervisors for each other.

During the process of being supervised, the relationship between psychiatrist and visitor is presented very clearly, which then helps psychiatrists come to understand the problems they may have in dealing with their visitors, according to Zhou.

Psychiatrists visiting other psychiatrists as patients and discharging negative emotions are both part of the healing process, according to Lin.

He said a psychiatrist needs about 500 to 1,000 such sessions before he reaches the highest level. "The frequency of this experience differs among different psychology schools. Typically, psychiatrists have this kind of session once a week," said Lin, adding that some practice as many as four times a week.  

He holds the opinion that any qualified psychiatrist can serve as a supervisor for other psychiatrists, but he emphasizes that this is just his opinion. 

"A supervisor is someone who offers suggestions. He lends his feelings to other psychiatrists and helps them analyze cases," said Lin.

A bright future

Both Ou and Lin think that there is much room for the industry to develop in China. 

Health insurance in some countries covers the costs of visiting psychiatrists, but this is not the case in China. "Only when health insurance covers this field will the industry develop normally, and psychiatrists can have a stable income," he proposed.

Lin believes that as the economy continues its rapid development, people will pay more attention to their mental health. By that stage, people will talk to psychiatrists before they start to suffer serious mental problems. "This gives an opportunity to psychiatrists, and also for psychiatric supervisors," he said.

About the Global Times

China changes every day. Sleepy villages transform into bustling suburbs, young hopefuls shoot to stardom online, and factories sprawl across former farmland while the farmers themselves face an uncertain future. As millions prosper, others find themselves stranded for the moment by the shifting tides of change.

The shock and thrill of the new is everywhere: new ideas, new brands, new stars, new words. Every hour sees a story break somewhere in this vast nation, whether from a corporate headquarters in Beijing or a mountain hamlet in Yunnan. 

The English-language Global Times is your key to understanding China’s changes. Founded in April 2009, the paper is one of the most dynamic players among Chinese media, and has rapidly become the major English newspaper in the nation. 

The Chinese public is not satisfied with old orthodoxies and stale stories, and neither is the Global Times. It provides in-depth coverage of controversial stories, from child AIDS victims to urban renewal, forced demolition and the fight against corruption. Its opinion pages feature heated debate over tough issues such as China’s use of the death penalty, the challenges of forming a new international order, and the nation’s growing wealth gap. 

The newspaper has become essential reading for every China-watcher. Jorge Guajardo, the Mexican Ambassador to China, describes the Global Times as “a must read for anyone wanting to understand China.” 

A measure of the Global Times’ success is the attention it has drawn from international press. Foreign media view the Global Times as a trustworthy source. The Economist calls it a “remarkable innovation,” which addresses “realms once thought taboo.” The Wall Street Journal praises its “insightful stories.” 

The Global Times’ readers, both foreign and Chinese, include ambassadors, business leaders, politicians, and intellectuals. China’s top universities use the newspaper as a teaching tool for the nation’s future elite. 

The Global Times’ unique partnership with the Global Poll Center keeps its finger on the pulse of the Chinese public, while an expanding online presence makes its unique insights even more accessible to a global audience. 

Beijing and Shanghai are joining the list of the world’s greatest cities. That is why the Global Times has 8-page daily supplements for each, keeping its readers up-to-date with what is happening in China’s two most exciting mega-cities. 

Reyhanli, TURKEY (facts of life)

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2013/05/2013517133642519671.html