Dear Colleagues,
The Newsletter of the American Psychoanalytic Association first appeared in February, 1967. Its editor was David Kairys, now deceased, a distinguished member of the Association. Since then, a succession of exceptionally able and dedicated editors, Shelley Orgel, Richard Isay, Theodore Jacobs, Peter Hartocollis, Alan Rosenblatt, Gerald Fogel, and most recently, Estelle Shane, have nurtured its development. During the twenty-two years of its existence, the Newsletter has provided a voice for the Association's leadership and members and a forum for discussing important organizational and professional issues. Over the past three years, the Newsletter has afforded its readers access to the thinking of important figures in American and international psyhoanalysis via a series of in-depth interviews conducted by Estelle Shane and Elise Snyder.
It is with some trepidation, then, that I begin my term as editor by introducing a number of major changes. Given the Newsletter's many successes, I am, of course, mindful of the risks involved. Nevertheless, I have decided, in consultation with my editorial staff and other members of the association, to give the publication a new name, a new logo, and a new design as well as bring to it some new emphases and approaches. Most important, the editorial staff itself has been expanded to include nine regular contributing editors each from a wide geographic base, with special talents and interests. Additionally, a panel of regional correspondents will cover news and other items of interest from the 35 component Societies, seven study groups and our candidates. The names of these correspondents will be found in the adjacent box. I would suggest that you keep this issue as space will not permit us to repeat the list in every issue. These members are your link to the Newsletter.
The editorial staff believes that psychoanalysis is served by the sharing of information among our widely dispersed membership. It is, in fact, the felt need to sustain. and promote concrete links that makes us a national organization and that has led to the choice of the Newsletter's new name: The American Psychoanalyst In addition to informing the membership of important events and issues, TAP will present our point of view and our image to the broader American psychoanalytic community and to colleagues in other countries. With this in mind, we hope to provide in the pages of TAP articles that transcend our specific organizational interests. An example is our extended coverage, in this issue, of the events commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Sigmund Freud's death, Future issues, will contain essays about the history of our organization, psychoanalysis generally and what we do that relates to more general human and social concerns. We also plan, from time to time and when space permits to provide our readers with psychoanalytic perspectives on cultural matters of interest. Our aim is to widen our scope: informing you about current organizational events and issues but also publishing articles in the service of insight into who we are today and how we came to be.
TAP will continue to be published quarterly on a quarterly schedule oriented around the two pivots of our yearly calendar, the Fall Meeting and the Annual Meeting. You can expect advance coverage of these events in TAP we hope whetting your appetite and encouraging your attendance. Your participation there—as well as in these pages—is actively solicited. Give us your suggestions: directly or through the regional correspondents about what you would like to see in the pages of TAP. We invite your letters, proposals for articles and manuscripts. The pages of The American Psychoanalyst are open to all the members of the American Psychoanalytic Association. It is our hope that through the next three years you will find what we offer on these pages lively, informative, interesting and rewarding reading.
Arnold D. Richards