Sigmund Freud's role in the history and development of psychoanalysis continues to be the standard by which others are judged. One of the most remarkable features of that history, however, is the exceptional caliber of the men and women Freud attracted as disciples and coworkers. One of the most influential, and perhaps overlooked, of them was the Hungarian analyst Sndor Ferenczi. Apart from Freud, Ferenczi is the analyst from that pioneering generation who addresses most immediately the concerns of contemporary psychoanalysts.

In Ferenczi's Turn in Psychoanalysis fifteen eminent scholars and clinicians from six different countries provide a comprehensive and rigorous examination of Ferenczi's legacy. Although the contributors concur in their assessment of Ferenczi's stature, they often disagree in their judgments about his views and his place in the history of psychoanalysis. For some, he is a radically iconoclastic figure, whose greatest contributions lie in his challenge to Freudian orthodoxy; for others, he is ultimately a classical analyst, who built on Freud's foundations. Divided into three sections, Contexts and Continuities, Disciple and Dissident, and Theory and Technique, the essays in Ferenczi's Turn in Psychoanalysis invite the reader to take part in a dialogue, in which the questions are many and the answers open-ended.

The significant increase in the number of working mothers over the last twenty years has led to widespread worries about the plight of “latchkey kids,” who return from school each day to empty homes. Concerned that unsupervised children might be at greater risk of delinquency, schools and communities across the nation began providing after-school activities. But many of these programs were hastily devised with little understanding of what constitutes a quality program that meets children’s developmental needs. The Fifth Dimension explores and evaluates one of the country’s most successful and innovative after-school programs, providing insightful and practical lessons about what works and doesn’t work after-school. The Fifth Dimension program was established in the 1980s as a partnership between community centers and local colleges to establish an educational after-school program. With an emphasis on diversity and computer technology, the program incorporates the latest theories about child development and gives college students the opportunity to apply their textbook understanding of child development to real learning environments. The Fifth Dimension explores the design, implementation, and evaluation of this thriving program. The authors attribute the success of the Fifth Dimension to several factors. First, the program offers a balance of intellectually enriching exercises with development enhancing games. Second, by engaging undergraduates as active participants in both learning and social activities, the program gives local community organizations a large infusion of high-quality help for their educational efforts. Third, by rewarding children for their achievements and good behavior with greater flexibility in choosing their own schedules, the Fifth Dimension acts as a powerful, enduring motivator. The Fifth Dimension program serves as a model for what an enriching after-school program can be. The product of years of innovation and careful assessment, The Fifth Dimension is a valuable resource for all who are interested in developing successful community-based learning programs.

How do attorneys who represent clients facing the death penalty cope with the stress and trauma of their work? Through conversations with twenty of the most experienced and dedicated post-conviction capital defenders in the United States, Fighting for Their Lives explores this emotional territory for the first time. What it is like for these capital defenders in their last visits or phone calls with clients who are about to be taken to the execution chamber? Or the next mornings, in their lives with their families, in their dreams and flashbacks and moments alone in the car? What is it like to do this work year after year? (These attorneys had, on average, spent nineteen years doing capital defense.)

Through vivid interviews amplified by the author's responses and commentary, these attorneys reveal aspects of their internal experience that they have never talked about until now. How do capital defenders manage the weight of the responsibility they carry? To what extent do they experience symptoms of trauma in the aftermath of losing a client to execution or as a result of the cumulative effects of engaging in capital defense work? What motivates them, and what do they draw upon, in order to keep engaging in such emotionally demanding work? Have they considered practicing other types of law? What can we learn from capital defenders not only about the deep and long-term effects of the death penalty but also about broader human questions of hope, effectiveness, success, failure, strength, fragility, and perseverance?

An argument that challenges the dominant “theory theory” and simulation theory approaches to folk psychology by claiming that our everyday understanding of intentional actions done for reasons is acquired by exposure to and engaging in specific kinds of narratives.

"Lucid and convincing...Makes clear that [Freud's] vision was limited both by the social climate in which he worked and the personal experiences he preferred, subconsciously, not to deal with."
—Los Angeles Times

Sigmund Freud was quite arguably one of the most influential thinkers of the twentieth century. Yet, over the last decade, portions of his theories of the mind have suffered remarkably accurate attacks by feminists and even some conservative Freudians. How could this great mind have been so wrong about women?

In The Freudian Mystique, analyst Samuel Slipp offers an explanation of how such a remarkable and revolutionary thinker could achieve only inadequate theories of female development. Tracing the gradual evolution of patriarchy and phallocentrism in Western society, Slipp examines the stereotyped attitudes toward women that were taken for granted in Freud's culture and strongly influenced his thinking on feminine psychology. Of even greater importance was Freud's relationship with his mother, who emotionally abandoned him when he was two years old. Slipp brings the tools of a trained clinician into play as he examines, from an object relations perspective, Freud's own pre-oedipal conflicts, and shows how they influenced Freud's personality as well as the male-centric shape of his theory.
Not limited to only one perspective, The Freudian Mystique analyzes how the entire contextual framework of individual development, history, and culture affected Freud's work in feminine psychology. The book then looks forward, to formulating a modern biopsychosocial framework for female gender development.

Freud's Paranoid Quest is an exceptionally broad-ranging and well-written book....Whether or not one agrees with certain of his arguments and assessments, one must acknowledge the remarkable intelligence that is displayed on nearly every page.
--Louis Sassauthor of Madness and Modernism and The Paradoxes of Delusion

John Farrell's Freud's Paranoid Quest is the most trenchant, exhilarating and illuminating book I have encountered in many years. [The book] should be pondered not just by all students of Freud's thought but by everyone who senses that 'advanced modernity' has by now outstayed its welcome.
--Frederick CrewsUniversity of California, Berkeley

In Freud's Paranoid Quest, John Farrell analyzes the personality and thought of Sigmund Freud in order to give insight into modernity's paranoid character and into the true nature of Freudian psychoanalysis. John Farrell's Freud is not the path-breaking psychologist he claimed to be, but the fashioner and prisoner of a total system of suspicion. The most gifted of paranoids, Freud deployed this system as a self-heroizing myth and a compelling historical ideology.

One of the most important questions in Freud scholarship concerns why, after touting traumatic childhood sexual abuse as the cause of hysteria, Freud turned away from “seduction theory” and instead created the Oedipus complex and the theory of childhood sexuality. In this study, Mary Marcel applies the most recent clinical work on trauma and recovered memory to Freud’s memories. Her use of rhetorical analysis reveals that Freud’s own reasons for abandoning the seduction theory were unfounded and misanalyzed. Marcel relates how, near the beginning of his self-analysis in 1897, Freud recovered a memory of having been molested by his nurse in infancy. Deeply troubled, Freud misread a favorite Greek myth and created the Oedipus complex as a means of regaining a sense of control over himself and the nurse’s crime. Marcel’s book is a comprehensive analysis of both the original Oedipus myths and the Greek myths of father-daughter incest. Closely analyzing Freud’s biography, his early career, his letters to his confidante Wilhelm Fliess and the Oedipus myth in its full complexity, Marcel applies a multiplicity of methods and casts a completely new light on what is in fact Freud’s thorough misrepresentation of both Oedipus and the incest taboo. By analyzing Freud’s arguments, recovered memories from self-analysis and misuse of classical sources, Marcel uncovers why Freud turned away from seduction theory, misconstrued Oedipus, and was unable to cure his own neurosis.

In From Madness to Mental Health, Greg Eghigian has compiled a unique anthology of readings, from ancient times to the present, which also includes an updated bibliography of first-person narratives on mental illness compiled by Gail A. Hornstein. This work neither glorifies nor denigrates the contributions of psychiatry, clinical psychology, and psychotherapy, but rather considers how mental disorders have historically challenged the ways in which human beings have understood and valued their bodies, minds, and souls.

The Future of Psychoanalysis explores the contemporary problem of multiple theories of psychoanalysis and argues for a return to a more classical position based on Freud’s work. Using his training in psychiatry, psychoanalysis, and philosophy, Richard D. Chessick examines the special combination of hermeneutics and natural science that characterizes Freud’s psychoanalysis, and investigates what goes on in the mind of the psychoanalyst during the psychoanalytic process. He maintains that while relativistic and intersubjective theories of psychoanalysis have value, they have gone too far and generated a plurality of theories removed from Freud, which has led to chaos in the field. The Future of Psychoanalysis challenges these trends and places this debate in the context of current mind/brain controversies and unresolved questions about human nature.