By Neil Altman (USA)

Neil Altman’s latest book looks at race and the significant role it plays in society and clinical practice. Much of the effort going into racial consciousness-raising rests on the concept of unearned “white privilege.” In this new Routledge title, Altman looks deeply into this notion, suggesting that there are hidden assumptions in the idea of white privilege that perpetuate the very same racially prejudicial notions that are purportedly being dismantled.

The book examines in depth the structure of racial categories, polarized between white and black, that are socially constructed, resting on fallacious ideas of physical or psychological differences among peoples. Altman also critically examines such related concepts as privilege, guilt and power. It is suggested that political positions are also artificially polarized into categories of “liberal”/”left” and “conservative”/”right” in ways that contribute to stereotyping people with different political leanings, foreclosing mutual respect, dialogue and understanding. Finally, White Privilege: Psychoanalytic Perspectives explores the implications for the theory and practice of psychoanalytic psychotherapy, discussing these ideas in detail and depth with clinical illustrations.

Altman’s rich clinical experience and his many years of engaging with racial and societal problems inform the book’s aim of a new agenda for understanding and offering analytic practice in contemporary society. It will appeal to clinician as well as anyone interested in social problems and how they manifest in society and in therapy today.

https://www.routledge.com/White-Privilege-Psychoanalytic-Perspectives/Altman/p/book/9780367503505

Neil Altman is on faculty at William Alanson White Institute and Honorary Member of its Society, and Visiting Faculty at Ambedkar University of Delhi, India. He is Editor Emeritus and Associate Editor of Psychoanalytic Dialogues and on the editorial staffs of Journal of Infant, Child, and Adolescent Psychotherapy; International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies; and The Journal of Child Psychotherapy. A Founding Board Member of IARPP, Neil is also author of Psychoanalysis in Times of Accelerating Cultural Change (2015) and The Analyst in the Inner City: Race, Class and Culture through a Psychoanalytic Lens (2010), as well as co-author of Relational Child Psychotherapy (2002).

GIF