Subjectivity, emotional resonance, and the sense of the real.

Abstract

The assumption of being inextricably embedded in one's own subjective perspective, on the one hand, and yet of being able to attune affectively to the subjective emotional states of another, on the other hand, underscores central theoretical contradictions in the study of subjectivity and intersubjectivity. More closely examining the nature and experience of subjectivity, including the notion of human “sameness” and relatedness, provides one way to reconcile these theoretical and practical contradictions. It is concluded that one's embeddedness in one's subjectivity actually facilitates the reciprocal and mutual processes of emotional resonance and unconscious communication. In this light, the notion of the “sense of the real” is understood and elaborated in the context of an additional dimension of therapeutic action in psychoanalysis. We cannot help but construct the real, even when it pleases us to think we are doing no more than perceiving it.—D. W. Winnicott The knower … registers the truth which he helps to create.—William James Strange, but not a stranger.— The Talking Heads