Into the Loop (Paperback)

Samuele Collu

ISBN 10: 1478032944 / ISBN 13: 9781478032946

Published by Duke University Press, North Carolina, 2026

About this Item

Paperback. Into the Loop asks how, and under what conditions, we can interrupt the repetitions that define us. Drawing from more than 200 hours of ethnographic observations of Systemic couples therapy in Buenos Aires, alongside auto-ethnographic recordings of Samuele Collus own hypnotherapy sessions, this study traces the psychic forces that compel people to repeat, interrupt, or drift aside from relational loops. Grounding his analysis in affect theory, psychoanalysis, and phenomenology, Collu examines how identification, affective transmission, compulsive repetition, and hypnosis play out within therapeutic encounters observed by teams of psychotherapists through one-way mirrors and closed-circuit television systems. This focus on visual mediation reveals how screens and observational devices both capture and distort the therapeutic process itselfa dynamic that connects to broader questions about digital media and user-screen relations in contemporary society. Written in an experimental and literary style that moves fluidly between the academic, the personal, and their uncanny in-betweens, Into the Loop offers a unique window into the repetitive cycles that shape our most intimate relationships and the possibilities for transformation within them. Based on ethnographic observations of more than two hundred hours of Systemic couples therapy and written in an experimental literary style, Into the Loop draws from affect theory, psychoanalysis, and phenomenology to ask how we can interrupt the repetitions that define us. Shipping may be from our Sydney, NSW warehouse or from our UK or US warehouse, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781478032946

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Into the Loop (Paperback)
• Publisher: Duke University Press, North Carolina
• Publication Date: 2026
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1478032944
• ISBN 13: 9781478032946
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

Into the Loop asks how, and under what conditions, we can interrupt the repetitions that define us. Drawing from more than 200 hours of ethnographic observations of Systemic couples therapy in Buenos Aires, alongside auto-ethnographic recordings of Samuele Collu’s own hypnotherapy sessions, this study traces the psychic forces that compel people to repeat, interrupt, or drift aside from relational loops. Grounding his analysis in affect theory, psychoanalysis, and phenomenology, Collu examines how identification, affective transmission, compulsive repetition, and hypnosis play out within therapeutic encounters observed by teams of psychotherapists through one-way mirrors and closed-circuit television systems. This focus on visual mediation reveals how screens and observational devices both capture and distort the therapeutic process itself—a dynamic that connects to broader questions about digital media and user-screen relations in contemporary society. Written in an experimental and literary style that moves fluidly between the academic, the personal, and their uncanny in-betweens, Into the Loop offers a unique window into the repetitive cycles that shape our most intimate relationships and the possibilities for transformation within them.

About the Author

Samuele Collu is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at McGill University.