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Institute Symposium
Wednesday December 10th 1pm to 2pm 2025
Steven H. Cooper The Play of Mourning
Cooper, S. H. (2023) The Play of Mourning. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association 71:61-82
Dr.Cooper has advanced our understanding of play in relation to particular forms of transference-countertransference responsiveness that emerge in analytic work. He defines playing as a form of responsiveness that involves a shift from more formal interpretation about defense, self-states, unconscious fantasy or transference to one that employs humor or irony regarding the content of fantasy, idiomatic language used to express affect or ideas, or the analyst’s more personally revealing reaction to the patient’s recruitment of him as an internal object.
His focus in this talk will be on highlighting a few of the particular qualities of play that activate the power of the analytic situation to facilitate mourning of depriving or frustrating objects. Dr. Cooper is not speaking about losing objects who have died or left the patient. Rather, his focus is on attachment to frustrating or unavailable objects whom patients cling to through conscious and unconscious fantasy. Through newly discovered forms of play, these processes are occurring now in real time between patient and analyst and less through frozen memorialization of what never was.
Steven Cooper, Ph.D. is a Training and Supervising Analyst at the Boston Psychoanalytic Society and Institute. He is a Clinical Associate Professor of Psychology at Harvard Medical School, Cambridge Health Alliance. He served as Joint Editor-in-Chief of Psychoanalytic Dialogues from 2007-2012 and is now Joint Chief Editor Emeritus.
Education Objectives:
1. Identify the specific qualities of play in analytic work that reflect shifts from traditional interpretation to more spontaneous, humorous, or personally revealing forms of transference–countertransference responsiveness.
2. Explain how these forms of play can activate the analytic situation’s capacity to facilitate mourning of frustrating or depriving internal objects, particularly those maintained through conscious or unconscious fantasy.
3. Analyze clinical material to determine how newly emergent forms of play between analyst and patient help loosen attachments to unavailable or frustrating objects in the here-and-now therapeutic relationship.
The presenter has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible companies to report.
Participants are asked to be aware of the need for privacy and confidentiality throughout the program. The Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute maintains responsibility for this program and its content. CPI is licensed by the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation to sponsor continuing education credits for (license numbers in parentheses): Social Workers (159.000122), Professional Counselors (197.000202), Marriage and Family Therapy Therapists (168.00204), and Clinical Psychologists (268.000091).
