Contemporary Psychoanalytic concepts in everyday life

2025-2026 One Year Program Materials

Syllabus information:

Instructor Reminder
Please email your syllabus and any associated readings to admin@wpacommunity.org no later than 14 days prior to your scheduled class. This ensures sufficient time for processing and distribution of materials.

Syllabus Template

APA Requirements checklist for syllabus creation

Guide for accurate references/readings

CE Instructions:

-Please be sure to sign in with your name to all classes you attend. After signatures are collected you will be contacted by our CE Coordinator, Darcy Schatz, to complete your evaluation. Once you complete the evaluation, you’ll be able to download a signed CE certificate.

Writing Reflection Guidelines

class Dates and Course Materials:

Class 1. 09.15.25
6:15pm-9pm

Location:
201 South Highland Ave
Suite 101
Pittsburgh, PA 15206

Title: Psychoanalysis and the Importance of Meaning-Making

Instructor: Miriam DeRiso, Ph.D.

Syllabus

Movie: “Lars and The Real Girl” (2007)

On: Amazon Prime Video, Google Play, Apple TV, You Tube, and on DVD at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh (many copies)

Please watch the movie before class. Class discussion will be based on the film.

Required Reading:

Shedler, J. (2022) that Was Then, This Is Now: Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy For The Rest Of Us, Contemporary Psychoanalysis, 58:2-3, 405-437

Optional Reading:

Peltz, R. (2020). Activating Lifeness in the Analytic Encounter: The Ground of Being in Psychoanalysis. Psychoanalytic Dialogues, (30)(3):267-282

McWilliams, N. (2021) Diagnosis and Its Discontents: Reflections on Our Current Dilemma. Psychoanalytic Inquiry 41: 565-579.

Ogden, T. (2019) Ontological Psychoanalysis or “What do you want to be when you grow up?”. Psychoanalytic Quarterly, (88)(4):661-684.

Class 2. 10.20.25
6:15pm-9pm

Location:
201 South Highland Ave
Suite 101
Pittsburgh, PA 15206

Title: Considering My Ethics In My Role As Psychotherapist

Instructors: Kevin Smith, PH.D., Sharon Bernstein, PH.D., Colleen Peddycord, LCSW

Syllabus

Media: The Sopranos. season 1. episode 1. available on various streaming services

Readings:
1. Smith, Kevin R. The Ethical Visions of Psychotherapy, Routledge, New York, N.Y. 2021 Chapter 1. pps. 1-4. Introduction: the Means and Ends of Therapy.

2. Smith, Kevin R. The Ethical Visions of Psychotherapy, Routledge, New York, N.Y. Chapter 2. pps. 4-27. The Ethics of Therapeutic aims

3. Smith, Kevin R. Therapeutic Ethics in Context and Dialogue, Routledge, New York, N.Y. 2021 Chapter 2. pps. 4-17. Therapy Against Ethics and the Ethics of Therapy.

Class 3. 11.17.25
6:15pm-9pm

Location:
201 South Highland Ave
Suite 101
Pittsburgh, PA 15206

Title: SIBLINGS: Enemies and Allies

Instructor: Bill Cornell, M.A., TSTA

Syllabus

Required reading:

Vuong, O. (2025). My Brother’s Keeper. New York Times, June 11, 2025. (The original video presentation of this essay will be shown in full during the seminar.)

Torres, J. (2011). We The Animals. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. (Selections from the novel. Portions of a movie adaptation will be shown during the seminar.)

Cornell, W.F. (2012). Lost and found: Sibling love, rivalry, loss, disconnection, and reconnection. Sidney, Au: Australian Centre for Integrative Studies, March 12, 2012.

Kieffer, C. (2008). On siblings: Mutual regulation and mutual recognition. Annual of Psychoanalysis, 36: 161-173.

Supplemental reading:

Hart, C. (2019). Welcoming siblings to Self Psychology: Exploring vertical and lateral selfobjects. Psychoanalysis, Self an Context. 14: 178-194.

Felsen, I. (2018). Parental trauma and adult sibling relationships in Holocaust-survivor families. Psychoanalytic Psychology, 35: 433-445.

Hoffman, A.G. (2015). Writing siblings: Alice James and her brothers. Psychoanalytic Review, 102: 1-32.

Class 4. 12.15.25
6:15pm-9pm

Location:
201 South Highland Ave
Suite 101
Pittsburgh, PA 15206

Title: The Universality of Shame

Instructor: Michael Mervosh

Syllabus

Media: Film - The Whale. (2022) Brendan Fraser. Protozoa Pictures, distributed by A24.

Required reading:

The Universality of Shame: A Psychoanalytic Approach; Malcolm Pine. The British Journal of Psychotherapy, (1990). (11)(3):346-357

Supplemental reading:

Shame – The Authority of Tenderness: Dignity and The True Self In Psychoanalysis; Paul Williams. Routledge, London & New York, (2022). (pg 51-58)

A Bionian Formulation of Shame: The Terror of Becoming One’s Self; Duncan Cartwright. International Journal of Psychoanalysis/Open Review; (2016) (3)(28):1-29

Working With Chronic & Relentless Self-Hatred, Self-Harm and Existential Shame: A Clinical Study and Reflections; Sue Austin. The Journal of Analytic Psychology; (2016) (61)(4):411-433

Class 5. 1.19.26
6:15pm-9pm

Location:
201 South Highland Ave
Suite 101
Pittsburgh, PA 15206

Title: Stories That Shape Us: The Therapist’s Transformation Through the Patient’s Lens

Instructor: Loren Sobel

Syllabus

Movie: Saint Omer

Available on multiple streaming platforms *Please watch the movie before class. Clips will be shown.

Required Reading:

Wilson, Mitchell. “Desire and Responsibility: The Ethics of Countertransference Experience.” The Psychoanalytic Quarterly, April 1, 2013.

Optional Readings:

McKay Ph.D., Rachel Kabasakalian. “Bread and Roses: Empathy and Recognition.” Psychoanalytic Dialogues 29, no. 1 (January 2, 2019): 75–91.

Jones, A. “Starvation and ‘The Dead Baby.’” Fort Da 23, no. 2 (2017): 41–65.

Class 6. 2.16.26
6:15pm-9pm

Location:
201 South Highland Ave
Suite 101
Pittsburgh, PA 15206

Title: Troubling Our Thinking and Feeling about Embodiment and Dis/abilities

Instructor: Patricia Donohue

Syllabus

Media:
There are three audio/visual resources for this class:

(1) Video: Sins Invalid, the 10 principles of disability Justice [13 minutes] https://sinsinvalid.org/10-principles-of-disability-justice/

(2) Video: Examined Life - Judith Butler & Sunaura Taylor [14 minutes] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0HZaPkF6qE

(3) Short film: Feeling Through [19 minutes]. Available to purchase for $3.00 on the film website: https://www.feelingthrough.com [also available for free via YouTube]

Readings:

Watermeyer, B. (2006). Disability and psychoanalysis. Disability and social change: A South African agenda, 31-43. [13 pages]

Harvey, C. (2020). The uncanny effect of disability: Uncomfortable maternal love for a disabled child. Contemporary Psychoanalysis, 56(1), 1-28.

Supplemental Readings:

Watermeyer, B., Hunt, X., Swartz, L., & Rohleder, P. (2019). Navigating the relational psychic economy of disability: The case of M. Psychoanalytic Dialogues. [18 pages]

Samuels, E. (2017). Six ways of looking at crip time. Disability studies quarterly, 37(3). [2 pages] https://dsq-sds.org/index.php/dsq/article/view/5824/4684

The supporting documentary for Feeling Through – Connecting the Dots [25 minutes]. Available through the website. https://www.feelingthrough.com

Class 7. 3.16.26
6:15pm-9pm

Location:
201 South Highland Ave
Suite 101
Pittsburgh, PA 15206

Title: Whose lens is it anyway? Contextualizing and historicizing psychoanalytic perspectives on transgender subjectivities

Instructor: Andi Eliza-Christie, LPC and Colleen Peddycord, LCSW

Syllabus

Media: Joynt, C. (Director). (2022). Framing Agnes [Film]. Fae Pictures; Level Ground.

Readings:

Hansbury, G. (2017). Unthinkable Anxieties: Reading Transphobic Countertransferences in a Century of Psychoanalytic Writing. Transgender Studies Quarterly 4:384-404.

Supplemental Readings:

Harris, A. (2022). Transgender and analytic countertransference. Psychoanalytic Review, 109, 277-286.

Saketopoulou, A. (2020). Thinking psychoanalytically, thinking better: Reflections on transgender. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 101, 1019-1030.