Melancholia Revisited w/Derek Hook (via telelink)

Description: Melancholia, as a sub-type of psychosis, is arguably not afforded the centrality it deserves in Lacanian overviews of the three structures and, relatedly, in more categorical discussions of psychotic phenomena. A good understanding of melancholia is helpful both in grasping the variety of forms of psychosis and in attending and responding to its various clinical instantiations. Different periods in Lacan's work provide distinct vantage-points on melancholia, and this talk will foreground two such perspectives: that espoused by Russell Grigg (foregrounding the role of object a) and one that highlights the symbolic dimension (i.e. in which melancholic suffering is linked to the impossibility of assuming a stable symbolic location). Advance reading and CPD points available.

Bio: Derek Hook is a Professor in Psychology and a clinical supervisor at Duquesne University, Pittsburgh. He is one of the editors (along with Calum Neill) of the Palgrave Lacan Series and of the four-volume Reading Lacan's Ecrits (with Calum Neill and Stijn Vanheule). He began his analytical training in London, at the Center for Freudian Analysis and Research. He is the author of Six Moments in Lacan (2016), Fanon, Psychoanalysis and Decolonial Psychology (2025).