Issues with ethnicity and racism in psychoanalytic psychotherapy. Whose problem is it anyway?

• Why is it so hard to discuss an individual’s ethnicity or culture in seminars or supervision?
• What happens when we fail to acknowledge difference?
• How can thinking about ethnicity and culture help to enrich our profession?

Whilst most trainings have introduced seminars on the subject, it is rarely considered in the theoretical aspects of the trainings in an integrated and ordinary way, nor is it often discussed in clinical seminars and supervision. This colour-blind position fails to see or acknowledge difference and hence the white individual is able to avoid the shame and guilt involved in owning any racist thought.

For the black trainee an important aspect of their identity and experience is not allowed expression, making the training experience a difficult one. Helen Morgan will present a paper suggesting that this situation has implications, not only for potential black applicants and patients, but also for our professional organisations where this covert form of racism shields ourselves and our theories from a potentially creative and enlivening challenge.