Abstract

SOREANU, Raluca. The Epistemic Style of Michael Balint: Balint Groups, Medical Utopias and the Legacy of the Budapest School of Psychoanalysis. Cad. psicanal. [online]. 2018, vol.40, n.39, pp. 229-250. ISSN 1413-6295.

The article analyses the relation between the thereotical ideas on health and illness of Michael Balint, his practice of working in groups with medical doctors ("Balint groups") and some lesser known epistemological ideas of the Budapest School of Psychoanalysis - Balint's psychoanalytic home. While Balint started his explorations with groups in the 20s and 30s in Budapest, his method matured after his exile in Great Britain, in the 50s. Grounding the analysis in the rich correspondence of Balint, found in Archive of the British Psychoanalytical Society, and in documents that capture the emergence of "Balint groups", the article aims to show the radical nature of Balint's work with medical doctos, as well as to propose a genealogy of this radical quality. Firstly, we reconstrue the cultural and political climate in Budapest in the 20s and 30s. Secondly, we focus on Sándor Ferenczi's epistemological ideas about the relation between psychoanalysis and medicine. Thirdly, we discuss the place of countertransference in the Budapest School of Psychoanalysis. Finally, we approach the particularities of the encounter between psychoanalysis and medicine, as it occurres in Great Britain, in the 50s.

Keywords : Michael Balint; Balint groups; Budapest School of Psychoanalysis; Countertransference; Utraquism.

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