Henri Ellenberger
Henri Ellenberger | |
---|---|
Born | Henri Frédéric Ellenberger 6 November 1905 Nalolo, Barotseland, Rhodesia |
Died | 1 May 1993 Quebec City, Canada | (aged 87)
Occupation(s) | Psychiatrist, medical historian |
Henri Frédéric Ellenberger (6 November 1905 in Nalolo,
Life
Henri F. Ellenberger was born in British Rhodesia to Swiss parents, and spent his childhood in the British colony of Rhodesia. He was later naturalised as a French citizen, and took his baccalaureate degree in Strasbourg, France, in 1924.
He studied medicine and psychiatry in Paris.[3] A student of Professor Henri Baruk, he obtained his doctorate in 1934,[4] while working at the famous Hôpital Sainte-Anne alongside such well-known contemporaries as Jacques Lacan (whose flair for self-publicity he early noted).[5]
Subsequent to the emergence of the
In 1953, in a major career change, Ellenberger became the lecturer at the
Publications and awards
Ellenberger is chiefly remembered for The Discovery of the Unconscious, an encyclopedic study of the history of dynamic psychiatry published in 1970. This work traced the origins of
Robin Skynner praised the clarity of its presentation of the ideas of the great twentieth-century figures in their socio-historical contexts.[8] Ellenberger's account of Pierre Janet has also been singled out for special mention;[9] while Anthony Stevens has made use of his concept of "creative illness" in his account of Jung.[10]
Gay also singled out for mention Ellenberger's 1972 article on
The Resource Center Henri Ellenberger in Paris was named in his honor.[13] During his lifetime he received many awards, including the Gold Medal of the Beccaria Prize in 1970,[14] and the Jason A. Hannah Medal of the Royal Society of Canada.[2]
He also wrote 40 booklets entirely in Esperanto.[15]
Characterisation
Ellenberger has been characterised as one of the mid-century, interdisciplinary independents in psychiatric thought.[16] His unique career path and independent, if moderate, Freudian revisionism, made him at times an isolated figure, especially with the biological turn in psychiatry at the close of the twentieth century.[17] His own belief in the central importance of the reality of the unconscious never faltered, however, even with the fading of his dream of a synthesis that "would do justice to the rigorous demands of experimental psychology and to the psychic realities experienced by the explorers of the unconscious".[18]
From 1956 to 1959, Ellenberger started teaching the history of psychiatry at the Menninger Foundation (where George Devereux already gave a lecture on psychoanalysis and anthropology).[19] The experience of exile played a key role in explaining the Ellenberger's interest in history.[20]
Criticism
Ellenberger has been criticised for modelling his picture of the origins of psychiatry in the Enlightenment clash with Demonology — in the triumph of illuminated reason over the blindness of faith.[21]
Works
- ISBN 0-465-01673-1.
- Beyond the Unconscious: Essays of Henri F. Ellenberger in the History of Psychiatry (Princeton 1993) ed. Mark S. Micale
- Doctors of the Soul (1995), ed. Elisabeth Roudinesco
- Rollo May, Ernest Angel, and Henri F. Ellenberger eds., Existence: A New Dimension in Psychiatry and Psychology (1958)
- Henri Ellenberger, "Dynamic Psychiatry: An Introduction. Lecture at the Menninger School of Psychiatry on August 22, 1956, Topeka, Kansas", ed. Emmanuel Delille, Zinbun (Kyoto University 2016), 47, p. 125-128.
See also
- Existential therapy
- Split personality
References
- ^ "Seite nicht gefunden". HLS-DHS-DSS.CH. Archived from the original on 2015-09-24.
- ^ a b "Micale, M.S., ed.: Beyond the Unconscious: Essays of Henri F. Ellenberger in the History of Psychiatry". Archived from the original on 2006-02-14. Retrieved 2006-08-12.
- ^ Elisabeth Roudinesco, Jacques Lacan (2005) p. 17
- ^ Mark S. Micale, 'Henri F. Ellenberger', in Discovering the History of Psychiatry (1994) p. 114
- ^ Roudinesco, p. 17 and p. 25
- ^ Emmanuel Delille, "On the History of Cultural Psychiatry: Georges Devereux, Henri Ellenberger, and the Psychological Treatment of Native Americans in the 1950s", Transcultural Psychiatry, 53 (3), 2016, p. 392-411.
- ^ Ann W. Burgess et al, Victimology (2009) p. 40
- ^ Robin Skynner/John Cleese, Families and how to survive them (1994) p. 301
- ISBN 978-0-19-866224-2.
- ISBN 0-14-012494-2.
- ^ Gay, p. 751
- ^ Micale, p. 112
- ^ "Classical Rorschach has moved". www.phil.gu.se. Archived from the original on 2012-02-04. Retrieved 2006-08-12.
- ^ "Encyclopédie de L'Agora - Ellenberger Henri".
- ^ (fr) Jean Bourbeau. Une bière avec la communauté espéranto de Montrealo (PDF), p. 40, Lumo, 2023 (1).
- ^ Micale, p. 113-4
- ^ Micale, p. 113
- ^ Ellenberger, p. 897
- ^ Emmanuel Delille, "Teaching the History of Psychiatry in the 1950s: Henri Ellenberger's Lectures at the Menninger Foundation", Zinbun, 47, 2016, 109-124.
- ^ Delille, p. 120-2
- ^ Micale, p. 227