Enactments Here, Enactments There, Enactments Everywhere: Enacted Symbols in A Psychoanalysis Presenter: Irving Steingart Ph.D Discussant: Kenneth Winarick, Ph.D. Date: January 13, 2000

Dr. Steingart conducted a workshop focusing on the emergence of enactments during the course of clinical work. His premise was that the concept of enactment has been overemphasized and loosely defined in recent psychoanalytic discussions. His goal was to clarify what is referred to by the term enactment and more carefully delineate the various phenomena that are often referred to by this term. Steingart borrowed Chused's description of enactments as originating when the patient becomes convinced of the accuracy of his or her perceptions. Subsequently, the patient acts in such a way that induces behavior in the analyst that supports his or her convictions. In his presentation, Steingart related the concepts of acting-out, enactment, and projective identification to the play-acting of children. In play-acting, children delineate the experience of themselves and others within an imaginary playful construct to which the participants must rigidly adhere. The participants in play-acting know that the play is imaginary, but this knowledge does not prevent the play from taking on concrete qualities with rigid expectations for the range of actions allowed. Just as in play-acting, where children insist on the rules of the play and the rigid roles of those involved in the play, so too is the analyst required to fill a role in the enactment. At such times, an interpretation of the acting-out/enactment will not be heard by the analysand who is rigidly and robotically composing the nature of the interaction. Steingart recommends that analysts treat the enactment just as they would any other free association, noting it for future reference when a more adequate platform for interpretation has been constructed. Analysis of the process is not possible at such moments, but Steingart contends that his clinical experience has shown that it is possible and preferable to refer back to these moments at a future point in time when the interpretation can be usefully heard and integrated.

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