Master of Arts in Psychoanalysis

This module provides students with the opportunity to conduct an independent, research-led investigation in the field of psychoanalysis under academic supervision. It is designed to consolidate advanced theoretical knowledge and to develop the learner’s capacity for autonomous research, critical synthesis, and scholarly argumentation at Master’s level.

Students formulate a research topic within the field of psychoanalysis and develop an appropriate theoretical and methodological framework in consultation with academic supervisors. While the primary focus remains psychoanalytic theory, students are encouraged to apply psychoanalytic concepts to adjacent disciplinary contexts, such as philosophy, literature, political theory, religious studies, or cultural analysis. Examples may include the application of psychoanalytic theory to classical metaphysics, romantic literature, mysticism, or contemporary social phenomena.

The module emphasises close engagement with primary and secondary scholarly sources. Students are required to propose and justify a structured reading list, which is subject to academic approval, and to situate their work within existing scholarly debates. Research outcomes are presented and critically discussed in an academic forum, requiring students to articulate, defend, and refine their arguments in response to scholarly critique. The module thereby prepares learners for advanced research activities and dissertation-level work in psychoanalysis and related fields.

This module introduces the foundational terminology, theoretical architecture, and philosophical underpinnings of Jungian analytical psychology, with a primary focus on its conceptual and philosophical dimensions rather than clinical technique. It provides a systematic overview of Jung’s theoretical framework, situating his work within—and in critical distinction from—the Freudian and Lacanian traditions of psychoanalysis.

The module examines Jung’s understanding of the psyche, emphasising key concepts such as the collective unconscious, archetypes, the structure of the ego, individuation, and the symbolic function. Particular attention is given to the development of the concept of synchronicity in Jung’s later writings, analysed in relation to its metaphysical, epistemological, and ontological implications. Through close engagement with Jung’s philosophical texts, the module interrogates how Jung departs from classical psychoanalytic assumptions concerning psychic causality, subjectivity, and the autonomy of the ego.

By critically engaging with Jungian propositions, students are encouraged to assess the broader implications of analytical psychology for theories of mind, meaning, and the relationship between the individual psyche and collective symbolic structures.

This module enables advanced engagement with major figures in the history and contemporary development of psychoanalytic theory through focused, research-led study. Rather than providing a general overview, the module concentrates on in-depth critical analysis of selected thinkers whose work has significantly shaped psychoanalytic discourse and its interdisciplinary extensions. The specific figures examined may vary across iterations of the module in response to developments in scholarship and emerging theoretical debates, while the intellectual level and learning outcomes remain constant.

The initial iteration of the module examines the work of Bracha Ettinger in relation to Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, and Gilles Deleuze. Through close readings of primary texts and selected critical commentaries, the module analyses core psychoanalytic concepts such as the drive, repetition, the unconscious, language, sexuality, and repression. Ettinger’s matrixial theory is explored in dialogue with Freudian and Lacanian frameworks, as well as Deleuzian critiques of psychoanalysis, in order to assess its theoretical innovations and implications.

The module situates these figures within broader postmodern political, economic, and cultural contexts, examining how contemporary psychoanalytic theory responds to changing conditions of subjectivity, desire, and social organisation. Students are encouraged to critically evaluate the relevance, limits, and transformative potential of these theoretical positions for understanding contemporary social, political, and media environments.

Based on Jacques Lacan’s Seminar VI, this module examines the theoretical foundations of the Lacanian interpretation of Sigmund Freud’s concept of desire and its central role within psychoanalytic theory. It explores desire as a constitutive dimension of the subject’s unconscious formation and analyses its articulation across clinical, theoretical, and social contexts.

Through close readings of selected texts by Lacan, alongside engagement with clinical material, the module investigates how desire operates in relation to key psychoanalytic concepts such as the drive, the death drive, jouissance, anxiety, and the unconscious. Particular attention is given to Lacan’s reworking of Freudian theory and the implications of this reconfiguration for psychoanalytic interpretation and practice.

The module situates desire as a pivotal concept for understanding both individual psychic structures and broader social phenomena. By integrating theoretical analysis with applied case-based discussion, students develop advanced fluency in Lacanian psychoanalysis and are equipped to critically apply its conceptual tools to clinical questions and forms of social critique.

This module provides an advanced thematic space for the critical exploration of selected topics in psychoanalysis that complement and extend the core curriculum. Rather than functioning as a survey module, it enables focused engagement with historically situated and conceptually demanding problems through psychoanalytic theory. The thematic focus of the module is reviewed periodically to reflect developments in scholarship, contemporary socio-political contexts, and emerging areas of academic inquiry within psychoanalysis and related disciplines.

The initial iteration of the module examines the interrelation between psychoanalysis, fascism, and romanticism. It applies psychoanalytic frameworks to the critical analysis of historical, literary, and symbolic materials from the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany, with particular attention to imagery, language, and fantasy structures present in military and paramilitary discourse, including that of the Freikorps. The module investigates the representation of gender, desire, repression, and collective fantasy, situating these phenomena within their historical conditions while interrogating their broader psychoanalytic significance.

This analysis is placed in dialogue with romantic literature and its psychoanalytic implications, particularly the desire for an imagined alternative world and its relation to nihilism, historical relativism, and authoritarian formations. By integrating historical and theoretical perspectives, the module encourages students to critically assess both the specificity of these phenomena in their historical context and their relevance for understanding recurring psychic and social structures in contemporary settings.

This module introduces foundational concepts, theoretical frameworks, and key figures within the psychoanalytic tradition. It begins with an examination of the structural division of the psyche into consciousness and the unconscious, and advances to core psychoanalytic concepts such as dreams and their interpretation across different psychoanalytic schools, the structure of the unconscious, the pleasure principle, the death drive, and the function of symbols.

The module further investigates multiple approaches to understanding the historical development of psychoanalysis, situating its emergence within its broader intellectual, social, and clinical contexts. Attention is given to the conditions preceding and surrounding its inception, as well as to the subsequent evolution of its central theoretical constructs. Particular emphasis is placed on the convergences and divergences among early psychoanalytic traditions, with focused engagement on the works of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. In this context, the module traces key Freudian and Jungian concepts and examines their ongoing reinterpretation and development within contemporary psychoanalytic scholarship.

This module examines the intersections between psychoanalysis, religion, and contemporary critiques of religious thought and practice. It introduces students to psychoanalytic concepts such as the unconscious (including collective formulations), drive, repetition, symbolism, and ritual, and analyses how these concepts have been employed to interpret religious phenomena across historical and cultural contexts.

The module surveys a range of religious traditions and practices, including folk religions and ritual forms, Christianity, Buddhism, and Daoism, in order to explore how religious structures engage with questions of meaning, transcendence, and the unconscious. Particular attention is given to symbolic systems and ritual practices as sites through which psychic structures interact with experiences of the unknown, the mystical, and the non-rational.

In addition, the module introduces key ideas and historical developments within Radical Theology, situating them within broader philosophical and psychoanalytic debates. By critically examining the implications of religious and theological frameworks for psychoanalytic theory and practice, the module enables students to evaluate the productive tensions and points of convergence between psychoanalysis and religious thought.

This module examines the relationship between psychoanalysis and Eastern philosophical traditions through two complementary lines of inquiry. First, it explores the historical development and contemporary practice of psychoanalysis in Eastern contexts, with particular emphasis on its institutionalisation and adaptation in China. Second, it investigates conceptual parallels and potential lines of influence between Eastern philosophies—especially Daoism—and the development of psychoanalytic theories in the West.

The module focuses on classical Daoist texts, including the Yi Jing and the Dao De Jing, and examines their resonance with key Jungian concepts such as synchronicity and the collective unconscious. In parallel, the module considers Winnicottian psychoanalytic theory and practice in order to analyse affinities between Eastern philosophical notions of relationality, non-duality, and process, and psychoanalytic understandings of subject formation and psychic development.

Rather than functioning as a purely comparative study, the module aims to develop a critical framework for assessing how Eastern philosophical concepts are reflected in, and potentially inform, contemporary psychoanalytic theory and clinical practice. Through this engagement, students are encouraged to critically interrogate dominant assumptions within psychoanalysis by situating them against alternative philosophical traditions.

This module applies psychoanalytic theory to the critical analysis of literature and film, with particular emphasis on the representation and structuring of desire in contemporary and postmodern media. It examines how psychoanalytic concepts illuminate the formation of subjectivity under late-capitalist conditions, focusing on the ways in which desire is shaped, mediated, and expressed within cultural texts.

Drawing on the works of Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, and G.W.F. Hegel, as well as contemporary psychoanalytic scholarship including Todd McGowan, the module approaches literature and film as privileged sites for examining the psychic consequences of social, economic, and ideological structures. Students are challenged to apply psychoanalytic concepts—such as desire, lack, enjoyment, fantasy, and repression—to selected works of contemporary film and literature in order to develop theoretically grounded interpretations of cultural phenomena.

The module positions psychoanalysis as a mode of social critique, demonstrating how philosophical and psychoanalytic frameworks can be integrated to analyse cultural production. By combining close textual and visual analysis with theoretical reflection, the module provides a rigorous foundation for understanding contemporary media through the lens of psychoanalytic theory.

This module critically examines the centrality of the body within the Freudian and post-Freudian psychoanalytic tradition, situating psychoanalytic theories of embodiment within broader social, political, and historical contexts. It explores the body as a site where individual psychic processes intersect with collective structures of power, care, exclusion, and vulnerability.

The module returns to Sigmund Freud’s early conceptualisation of “conversion” to analyse how bodily symptoms emerged as a foundational problem in the formation of the unconscious and the psychoanalytic method. Freud’s understanding of the body as a “somatic preserve” is examined as a point of tension between psychic conflict and social-historical conditions. Building on this foundation, the module interrogates the relationship between bodily symptoms, language, memory, conflict, and desire, questioning models that assume a unidirectional translation of somatic experience into symbolic meaning.

The module further engages with Jacques Lacan’s reconfiguration of Freudian concepts, particularly his critique of symbolic over-interpretation, his emphasis on jouissance, and the relation between anxiety, the body, and the limits of knowledge. Through these perspectives, students are invited to reconsider the role of embodiment in psychoanalytic theory and practice, and to assess the implications this poses for clinical listening and interpretation.

The Psychoanalysis Dissertation constitutes the capstone research component of the degree and is composed of two integrated phases: a Research Planning phase (“The Research Plan”) and a Research Execution phase (“The Dissertation”). Together, these phases support the development and completion of a substantial, original, and independent research project at MQF / EQF Level 7.

The Research Plan phase prepares students to design a coherent and methodologically sound research project within the field of psychoanalysis. Under the guidance of a designated supervisor, students refine a research question that typically emerges from prior taught modules and evaluate its theoretical grounding, methodological viability, and scholarly significance. The emphasis of this phase is on structuring inquiry rather than providing a general introduction to research methods; methodological engagement is framed specifically in relation to the proposed dissertation topic.

During this phase, students develop a structured research portfolio that includes the formulation of a provisional title, abstract, literature survey, methodological justification, and a realistic timeline to completion. This portfolio establishes the conceptual, theoretical, and organisational framework that will guide the subsequent dissertation.

Upon approval of the Research Plan, students proceed to the Dissertation phase, during which they conduct sustained independent research resulting in a dissertation of approximately 12,000 words (±10%). The dissertation must demonstrate critical engagement with primary and secondary sources, theoretical coherence, methodological rigour, and an original contribution to scholarly discussion within psychoanalysis. Regular supervisory meetings support the development, integration, and refinement of the dissertation, culminating in preparation for examination.