On the Clinical Relevance of Selected Postmodern Ideas with a Focus on Lyotard's Concept of “Differend”

I hope this article will inspire postmodern psychoanalysts to join with me in thinking collaboratively about the clinical problem of “differends.” Clinical differends are problems that come about because people, taken aback by what others say, lose their ability to respond creatively and spontaneously. Postmodernism theorizes about differends in ways that suggest solutions.

But before I explain this problem further, I would like to clarify what I mean by “postmodern psychoanalysts” and also what I mean by a “postmodern collaboration.” These are key terms in this essay. Clarifying them will not only help me explain my invitation, but it will also help me explain my thoughts on dealing with the clinical problem of differends.

Who are the postmodern analysts that I hope will collaborate with me? You may be postmodern and not know it. It is not like being a female, or like being from Texas. That is, it is not an identity that any of us have grown up with. It is more a matter of discovering later in life that there is a name for what one believes.

Those who are postmodern are the ones who tend to be eclectic. They distrust comprehensive theories that present themselves as the last word. They search the literature for ideas rather than for answers, and they are less concerned with who wrote what than with the power of what was said to spark creativity inside their own minds. For such clinicians, postmodern theory is a garden of useful ideas.

This definition of postmodernism follows after the work of Jean-Francois