I want to thank you for publishing the series of articles on the history of local societies and institutes which have recently been appearing in The American Psychoanalyst. For me, these articles have served both a practical and a more deeply theoretical function.

From the purely practical point of view, they have been of inestimable value in helping me comprehend the milieus in which my psychoanalytic colleagues have grown up around the country. At numerous meetings of The American, as well as in personal communications, I have encountered colleagues who identify themselves as having been trained in one or another institute in, say, Los Angeles, or as adhering to one or another school of thought in some other city. Thanks to your articles, I now have a greatly enhanced sense of where, quite literally, my colleagues “are coming from” when they so identify themselves.

Important as this service has been to me, however, I feel that these articles exercise an impact beyond such purely practical concerns. Because they are written with such skill, these essays illuminate the theoretical controversies that suffuse our discipline. In a most interesting fashion they illustrate how often such Methodenstreite have evolved from interpersonal conflict, and have in turn contributed to more such conflict. In other words, the articles hold a mirror up to ourselves. It is fascinating, and more than a little disturbing, to observe the extent to which psychoanalysis as a profession suffers from the disavowal and disguised conflicts that our individual patients experience and for which we treat them.

Once again, thank you for your invaluable service.

Joyce Root, M.D.

Waban, MA