1 Whatever Happened to the Unconscious? A Critique of Dissociation, Multiplicity, and the Eclipse of a Unitary Self:

Contemporary perspectives on the unconscious vary widely in scope and content, from displacing the dynamic unconscious altogether, to appealing to neuroscience, to favoring postmodern sensibilities that subordinate psychical processes to language. Donnel Stern and Philip Bromberg are two such proponents of these redirective shifts in contemporary thought; and the force of their ideas have arguably reshaped the way many contemporary analysts have come to conceive of mental processes. However rich in clinical utility, these theoretical postulates are not without serious conceptual omissions, particularly when raising the question of selfhood, agency, and unconscious enactments. In what follows, I will attempt to offer an adumbrated meditation on the philosophical implications of their claims with the hope that this may lead to a spirited dialogue between advocates of a dissociative model of mind and those who privilege a dynamic unconscious. Both Stern and Bromberg have enjoyed theoretical prominence within contemporary psychoanalysis by questioning the presupposed dominion of the unconscious over the puissance of consciousness and language. One cannot ignore in good faith how herculean, causally efficacious, and advantageous conscious experience, especially the role of language, has o