My father's flags: psychoanalytic perspectives on being an American from the streets and the consulting room

Abstract

In this paper the author explores the generational object of the American flag in three periods of American history: the post World War Two era, the late 1960s and early 1970s, and the period immediately following 9/11. In each of these periods the flag holds a difference resonance. In the first it symbolized the assurance of a measure of freedom and social security; in the second it represented the imposition of American dominance abroad; and in the third the flag was used to justify a new and unnecessary war. The author argues that a new flag is needed, one that signifies a revitalized ‘progressive patriotism’ dedicated to reclaiming and rebuilding the institutions that have been eroded in this period of American history. The paper then shifts from the symbol of the flag to the psychoanalytic consulting room. The author maintains that psychoanalytic development and clinical theories now stop short of the examining the psychic relationship to the social world outside of the family and that in order to truly help people live fully in the ‘place that they live’, psychoanalysis must extend its theories and clinical interventions beyond the Oedipal triad to communal groupings the larger society. Copyright © 2004 Whurr Publishers Ltd