You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
To the outsider, neuropsychoanalysis may seem like an overwhelming field. Psychoanalytic theory is multifaceted enough, but add to that the complex dynamics of the brain and the combination can feel unapproachable.
Casey Schwartz's In the Mind Fields: Exploring the New Science of Neuropsychoanalysis is not intended to be a primer about neuropsychoanalysis. On its face, it is about the journey Schwartz began in : how she was drawn to psychoanalysis in high school and then neuroscience at the University of California, Los Angeles, and how her dual interest led her to pursue a master's degree in both subjects at the Anna Freud Centre in London and Yale University—a hybrid that Schwartz aptly calls “an unlikely undertaking” (p. xii). She continued her education after graduation on her own, attending conferences and interviewing and observing neuroscientists and neuropsychoanalysts, especially Mark Solms. She became a journalist who wrote about these disciplines that study the mind, which had become her passion.
For a reader who knows little or nothing about psychoanalysis, neuroscience, or neuropsychoanalysis, Schwartz offers an introduction to the disciplines, and to the conflicts among the scholars, theorists, analysts, and scientists who have been the pioneers and leaders in each. The reader with a more extensive background may find the book interesting because it follows how Schwartz became fascinated by the relationship between the brain and the psyche, and how she became a participant in and later an observer of work with the brain. Solms's colleagues and admirers will likely enjoy reading about the time Schwartz spent with him, interviewing him and learning from him.