Alienation in Perversions

Perversions and borderline states were, by accident of fate, Masud Khan's chief preoccupation in his clinical work during the last three decades of his life. In an earlier volume, The Privacy of the Self, he presented what he called the natural and private crystallization of his experience with his patients and teachers; notably, in the latter category, Anna Freud, John Rickman and D.W. Winnicott. In this later book he takes his cue from Freud who, as he says, diagnosed the sickness of Western Judaeo-Christian cultures in terms of "the person alienated from himself".Masud Khan's basic argument, succinctly stated in his Preface, is that "the pervert puts an impersonal object between his desire and his accomplice. This object can be a stereotype fantasy, a gadget or a pornographic image. All three alienate the pervert from himself, as, alas, from the object of desire".With its wealth of clinical and theoretical insights, Masud Khan's Alienation in Perversions makes a major contribution to our understanding of perversion formation. Its influence extends far beyond the private discipline of psychoanalysis, for the subject explored is one which occurs widely in modern life and literature. The concluding chapter on pornography makes the point tellingly. CONTENTS......Page 8 Preface......Page 10 1. Reparation to the self as an idolized internal object......Page 12 2. Intimacy, complicity and mutuality in perversions......Page 19 3. The role of polymorph-perverse body-experiences and object-relations in ego-integration......Page 32 4. The role of infantile sexuality and early object-relations in female homosexuality......Page 57 5. Role of the 'collated internal object' in perversion-formations......Page 121 6. Fetish as negation of the self: clinical notes on foreskin fetishism in a male homosexual......Page 140 7. Cannibalistic tenderness in nongenital sensuality......Page 178 8. Ego-orgasm in bisexual love......Page 186 9. The role of will and power in perversions......Page 198 10. From masochism to psychic pain......Page 211 11. Pornography and the politics of rage and subversion......Page 220 Chronological Bibliography......Page 228 Bibliography......Page 230 Index......Page 240 Perversions and borderline states were, by accident of fate, Masud Khan's chief preoccupation in his clinical work during the last three decades of his life. In an earlier volume, The Privacy of the Self, he presented what he called the natural and private crystallization of his experience with his patients and teachers; notably, in the latter category, Anna Freud, John Rickman and D.W. Winnicott. In this later book he takes his cue from Freud who, as he says, diagnosed the sickness of Western Judaeo-Christian cultures in terms of "the person alienated from himself". Masud Khan's basic argument, succinctly stated in his Preface, is that "the pervert puts an impersonal object between his desire and his accomplice. This object can be a stereotype fantasy, a gadget or a pornographic image. All three alienate the pervert from himself, as, alas, from the object of desire".With its wealth of clinical and theoretical insights, Masud Khan's Alienation in Perversions makes a major contribution to our understanding of perversion formation.