Constructing the Self, Constructing America

Cushman (California School of Professional Psychology) uses an interpretive historical approach to the cultural history of psychotherapy to show how and why the discipline was created and its role in American life, arguing that its establishment as a social institution may reproduce some of the ills it is meant to heal. He suggests a way to use interpretive methods in the everyday practice of psychotherapy. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.

In this unsettling study, historian and psychotherapist Cushman maintains that each epoch produces a distinct configuration of the self?the "nondeep, horizontal, inclusive" self of the ancient Greeks; the communal self of the Hebrews, a partner with God; the crusading medieval Christian self, container for the immortal soul; etc. In modern times, the "empty self," marked by a pervasive sense of personal hollowness, is committed to self-liberation through consumption. Cushman, who teaches at the California School of Professional Psychiatry and the Saybrook Institute, argues that psychotherapy, permeated by the ethos of self-contained individualism, unknowingly reinforces the isolated, status quo-oriented empty self. After reviewing the theories of Freud, Jung, Harry Stack Sullivan, Melanie Klein and Donald Winnicott, he urges therapists to acknowledge the importance of moral discourse with the patient and to adopt a perspective that recognizes the individual's links to society. This dense yet rewarding study delves into mental asylums, maladies of Victorian women, African American minstrel shows, mesmerism and advertising campaigns.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Taking complementary approaches, these two authors examine the interrelationship of psychology and American culture and come to different conclusions to explain psychology's preeminent role in American life today. A psychotherapist and a teacher at the California School of Professional Psychology and at Saybrook Institute, Cushman shows how psychotherapy developed here and how it influenced the way Americans view themselves. Herman (social studies, Harvard) accounts for the unacknowledged role of behavioral scientists in shaping political and social policy in the United States over the last 50 years. In a series of related studies, covering such diverse areas as minstrel shows, mesmerism, psychoanalysis, comic strips, and advertising campaigns, Cushman examines the evolving concept of the individual in the United States and Western European society. Demonstrating that each era defines its concept of the self, Cushman contends that psychotherapy supports the individualism characteristic of 20th-century Americans: an "empty self," alienated from society and preoccupied with fulfillment through consumption. Herman surveys the role of behavioral science in shaping U.S. public and foreign policy beyond World War II. Academics and clinicians, mobilized to assist the war effort, conducted research on human behavior. After the war, these experts continued their research, advising politicians on matters relating to domestic and foreign policy including Project Camelot, race relations, the Kerner Commission on urban riots, and democratic movements in foreign countries. Clinical psychologists guided the transition from military to civilian life, shifting psychology's focus in the public mind from treatment of mental illness to promotion of mental health. Both books are recommended for academic and large public libraries where there is a focus on the history of ideas, psychology, and American culture.?Lucille Boone, San Jose P.L., Cal.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Few words in modern speech carry more conjuring power than self, a power evident in contemporary incantations of self-esteem, self-assertion, self-validation, and self-actualization. Self-talk, however, will never again sound quite the same to readers of Cushman's provocative analysis of American psychotherapy. For what Cushman shows most clearly is that the self has changed from era to era as American culture itself has evolved. The bourgeois Anglo-Saxon self of a conformist nineteenth-century America would scarcely recognize its offspring, the alienated, rebellious self of a chaotic twentieth century. Psychotherapy--the science of healing the self--has likewise metamorphosed in response to cultural and political pressures. As Cushman chronicles the changes in psychotherapy, he also reflects on the ways marketers and politicians have appropriated psychological theory for dubious ends. Even within his discipline, the author uncovers evidence that psychoanalysts have misused Freud's legacy. In particular, he challenges the decision by psychoanalysts of the l920s and 1930s to focus on the individual psyche and not on the social context in which the psyche must live and find meaning. A genuine healing of the self, he concludes, will require a reshaping of the society that gives the self its identity. Bryce Christensen