$15 (paper).

Ferenczi’s “confusion of tongues ” (1980/1933) spoke to differences between adults and children. The metaphor could easily be applied to a much broader range of issues in today’s psychoanalysis. Ample grounds for confusion were provided by Freud. As we know, he used the very term psychoanalysis to describe at least three different enterprises: a theory of mind, a theory of psychopathology, and a treatment method. Many of our seemingly basic terms are similarly used in so many ways even in one language, let alone the many into which Freud’s work has been translated. The ways in which we speak with one another include cultural, linguistic, and substantive differences often difficult to untangle. A considerable literature has addressed definitional matters, but the present state of affairs has gone, it seems, beyond mere confusion to Babel. It is easy to decry this situation, and those concerned with psychoanalysis as a science (as was Freud), may be among those most troubled by it. As an alternative perspective: the very subject matter staked out by the founder is so complex in its nature-encompassing the multiple dimensions of human nature- that this century of definitional confusion has been both necessary and heuristic. The human mind/brain is comprised o