Ars moriendi kao ars vivendi u svjetlu kršć anske vjere

Author(s): Tomislav Smiljanic / Language(s): Croatian / Issue: 43/2015

U današnjem postmodernom i postmetafi zičkom vremenu govor o umiranju i smrti, a s njime nužno povezan govor onda i o trpljenju i patnji, ne samo da je nepoželjan i neprimjeren, nego ga se nastoji pod svaku cijenu izbrisati i iz čovjekove misli i govora, iako je smrt sastavni, svakodnevni dio naše svakodnevnice, i ona se događa na svakom koraku, do te mjere da mediji zabilježe i prenesu svaku nesreću bilo kojeg oblika u kojoj se dogodila smrt. Čovjek znanstveno-tehničke civilizacije ježi se od pomisli na smrt i svaki govor o njoj nastoji eliminirati iz svog svakodnevnog življenja. Dok je srednjovjekovni čovjek, pa i onaj renesanse i humanizma usmjeravao svoj život prema načelu ars vivendi kao ars moriendi, i onda u trenutku smrti doživio ars moriendi kao ars vivendi, čovjek 19. i 20. st. više ne prakticira ovu dijalektičku napetost između umijeća življenja i umiranja. Znatan doprinos promijeni ove svijesti i mentaliteta donijela su otkrića i spoznaje prirodnih i tehničkih znanosti, koje su napredovale nezaustavljivim tijekom od 19. st. pa sve do danas. One su obećavale čovječanstvu spasenje i oslobođenje od svih prirodnih ograničenja, materijalni napredak i odgovore na sva pitanja koja su mučila čovječanstvo od postanka. Svojim lažnim sekularnim soteriologijama i eshatologijama osiromašile su čovjekov tubitak i izbacili ga na još veću moralno-etičku pustoš čijoj se krizi ne nazire kraj. U takvoj ispražnjenoj duhovnoj situaciji na poimanje smrti i završetka ljudskog života gleda se na nešto zastrašujuće i utonuće u apsolutno ništavilo. Zato je bolje za današnjeg čovjeka o fenomenu smrti i ne razmišljati prema staroj antičkoj rečenici fi lozofa Epikura: “Smrt, to najstrašnije zlo, nema nikakvog posla s nama; jer dok mi postojimo, smrti nema, a kad ona stigne, onda nas više nema. Tako, dakle, smrt ništa ne znači ni za žive ni za mrtve, jer se živih ne tiče, a mrtvi više ne postoje”.

CZY POLSKA PSYCHOLOGIA MA SWOJĄ HISTORIĘ? RÓŻNE OBLICZA HISTORII PSYCHOLOGII

Author(s): Wlodzislaw Zeidler / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2016

The reason for the question in the title is that during the First World War, Poland was not an independent country so there was no official Polish psychology contribution in the war effort. Nevertheless, psychology was allowed to be developed at two universities (Cracow and Lvov) as an academic discipline. On the other hand, in the areas under Russian jurisdiction the development of psychology started as a practical discipline (organization of psychologists – Polish Psychological Society, care for children with special needs – Szyc, Grzegorzewska). In the areas that would soon become Polish again, as early as at the beginning of the 20th century, psychology was being developed in Polish language and it served exclusively peaceful purposes (education, manufacturing) for the future independent state. That means, that as opposed to other “European psychologies” before and after the First World War, Polish psychology did exist and was developed strictly for peaceful purposes.

EMIL KRAEPELIN AND GERMAN PSYCHIATRY IN MULTICULTURAL DORPAT/TARTU, 1886–1891

Author(s): Maike Rotzoll,Frank Grüner / Language(s): English / Issue: 4/2016

When the later famous psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin (1856–1926) was called to the University of Dorpat/Tartu at the age of 30, he probably did not busy himself much with the multicultural situation that he found there. Like many of his academic contemporaries, he regarded this Baltic university, then still German-speaking and one of the most important in the Russian Empire, as a kind of exile or at least only a way station for his career, which he hoped to pursue within the German Empire. He brought his research programme for the upcoming discipline of psychiatry with him, as the author of the compendium which, in the course of several editions, became a multi-volume, influential textbook. But at his new venue he found not only a complicated situation of (university) politics caught between negotiation processes among the various cultural groups, but also students from many regions and with different mother tongues, who had to adapt to the official language of instruction. In addition, he took over a recently founded university psychiatric clinic, where all parts of the population were represented, but with whom he could communicate only in a rudimentary manner, as far as the non-German-speaking population groups were concerned. But how did the patients from such different language families manage to make themselves heard in the world of university clinics headed by mostly German-speaking physicians, especially in psychiatry, a discipline particularly dependent upon language? What translation processes were performed by whom over the working therapeutic day, and what were the effects of this partial loss of speech on clinical research? What opportunities resulted from precisely this multi-lingual situation in a contact zone between Western Europe and Russia for psychiatric science and practice? This paper attempts to provide some preliminary answers to these questions, using already known and newly discovered sources.

EMIL KRAEPELIN’S INAUGURAL LECTURE IN DORPAT: CONTEXTS AND LEGACIES

Author(s): Eric J. Engstrom / Language(s): English / Issue: 4/2016

In his inaugural lecture delivered at the University of Dorpat in 1886, the German psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin presented one of the most concise accounts of the state of psychiatric research in the late nineteenth century. In his lecture, Kraepelin criticized the patho-anatomic research of contemporary neuropsychiatrists and argued that psychiatric research needed to be augmented by a new emphasis on experimental psychology. This article explores the historical contexts that informed Kraepelin’s research agenda in experimental psychology. It argues that Kraepelin’s early experimental research in Dorpat served as a catalyst for his later clinical research in Heidelberg in the sense that it evoked recognition of the importance of disease course and prompted him to expand the breadth of available information about patients beyond what laboratory research could provide. Kraepelin’s experimental research can therefore neither be dismissed entirely, nor posited as the wellspring of his nosology, but needs instead to be viewed as a crucial tool of accurate diagnostic practice.

EMIL KRAEPELIN’S SUCCESSOR PROF. VLADIMIR CHIZH, HIS RESEARCH METHODS AND -OBJECTS

Author(s): Ken Kalling / Language(s): English / Issue: 4/2016

. Professor of psychiatry Vladimir Chizh was a successor of Emil Kraepelin at the University of Tartu (now: Estonia; then: Russian Empire) during the years 1891–1916. The same period witnessed the second and decisive rise in Estonian national movement leading finally to the foundation of Estonian state in 1918. A particular character in Estonian national discourse was its notorious biologisation, i.e. strong presence of eugenical ideology. Professor Chizh’s scientific research supported this tendency. In 1901 Chizh published a study in which he compared the criminal activity of Estonians and Latvians. Chizh’s method derived from an assumption that the two neighbouring Baltic populations possess an extremely similar environmental, cultural and socio-political background. The biological (racial) essence of the two groups he believed to differ – Latvians belonging to Indo-European nations, Estonians being Finnic. Deriving from the previous – if any differences in the criminal behaviour of the two existed, these could be explained by biological factors. In the results of his work Chizh reported on a notorius disbalance in the criminality of the two nations, Estonians exceeding Latvians in a rough ratio 5:3. Chizh, supporting the teaching of Cesare Lombroso, had achieved in such a way his goal, i.e. he believed that he had proved the biological essence of criminal behaviour. For the Estonian community the study by Chizh opened a subsequent field for further discussions on the topic ‘nature versus nurture’.

FRANCISZKI BAUMGARTEN EMPIRYCZNE BADANIE KŁAMSTWA U DZIECI I MŁODZIEŻY

Author(s): Wlodzislaw Zeidler / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2016

At the turn of 19th and 20th century Frances Baumgarten’s empirical research was one of the positive influences in the development of psychology, otherwise clearly hampered by political barriers and ideological influences. It was particularly important for the development of psychological terminology in each of the emerging new countries. Frances Baumgarten’s research, which was done in 1914 and published in several publications in Polish 13 years later, shows one of the more interesting and particularly valuable examples of the development of empirical research methodology and is the evidence of high development and specialization of Polish psychological language.

History of Psychotherapy in the Czech Lands

Author(s): Jirí Motl,Anna Vanecková,Matyáš Müller,David Studenovský / Language(s): English / Issue: 01/2015

The article covers the history of psychotherapy in the present-day Czech Republic, focusing mainly on the era of the Communist dictatorship which lasted from 1948 to 1989. However, we also investigate how psychotherapy developed before Communism and how the period of totalitarianism is reflected in the present state of psychotherapy in the Czech Republic. Apart from psychotherapy in the narrow sense, we will mention related fields such as psychohygiene, philosophy, religion, development of psychology as a scientific discipline, mental health care, consultancy, etc. In the first part, we describe the history of psychotherapy in Czechoslovakia, which we will divide into five periods: 1. before the Communist putsch in 1948; 2. from the Communist putsch to the late 1950s (severe dictatorship); 3. the 1960s (liberalisation of the regime and a development of civic society); 4. from 1968 to 1989 (a period of the so-called normalisation when the regime strengthens again in the 1970s and weakens in the 1980s); 5. the period after the so-called Velvet Revolution (1989). In the second part, we will briefly address two specifically Czech therapeutic approaches (Mr. and Mrs. Knobloch’s integrated psychotherapy and the SUR training program).

Identitás és asszimiláció

Erich Fromm, Bruno Bettelheim és Erik H. Erikson amerikai pályája

Author(s): Ferenc Eros / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 2/2016

The essay attempts to compare the careers of three famous psychoanalysts, Erich Fromm, Bruno Bettelheim, and Erik H. Erikson from the point of view of the history of science and the sociology of knowledge. All of them came from Central Europe, from Jewish families. Their life work unfolded in America, but their thinking had been determined by their European experiences and questions: the meaning of freedom, the dilemma of survival, and the nature of identity. In the 1960s and 1970s they were respected not only as psychoanalysts and social thinkers, but as public intellectuals, too. For today, however, they became “forgotten intellectuals”. The essay points out those social, scientific, political, and personal factors that played a part in their decline.

Istoty pozaziemskie w poszukiwaniu miłości

Author(s): Julia Kristeva / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 7/2016

First polish translation of Julia Kristeva's short essay on masochism.

Krafft-Ebing

Author(s): Georges Bataille / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 7/2016

George Bataille on Richard von Krafft-Ebing.

Motywy masochistyczne w prozie i rysunkach Brunona Schulza

Author(s): Henry Wegrocki / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 7/2016

The article by Doctor Henry Joseph Wegrocki was published for the first time inPsychoanalytic Review in 1946. It is a psychiatric analysis of masochistic motives thatare present in the short stories and drawings by Bruno Schulz. In the text, one candiscover a rough pencil sketch of a droshky drawn especially for Wegrocki and an excerptfrom Schulz’s letter, in which he writes explanatory comments upon his creativeness and perversion. The paper presents the Polish translation of the text.

O empirycznym wykorzystaniu teorii kratyzmu Władysława Witwickiego

Author(s): Amadeusz Citlak / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 39/2016

This article presents the main assumptions of Władysław Witwicki’s kratyzm theory as one that has not been used empirically. This is one of the most original theories in Polish psychology that has never been transferred to the psychological laboratory, although its explanatory potential seems to be large. The first part discusses the main features of the theory, the second indicates those aspects of it that are not mentioned elsewhere and seem to be vital in the planning of experimental research. The pursuit of power theory, with all its originality, does not account for certain psychological variables, and does not define the important links between them. This problem seems to be important for the verification efforts of its individual claims.

O PSYCHOLOGICZNEJ I WOJENNEJ MISJI TWÓRCY SZKOŁY LWOWSKO-WARSZAWSKIEJ

Author(s): Teresa Rzepa / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2016

The double mission, ideally fulfilled by Kazimierz Twardowski, the founder of the Lvov-Warsaw School, is discussed in the article. Twardowski fulfilling his psychological mission all his life while the war mission lasted three years (1914–1917), when he was carrying out the role of the president (rector) of the Lvov University. A short biography of Kazimierz Twardowski precedes the descriptions of those missions.

POGLĄDY WILHELMA WUNDTA NA TEMAT I WOJNY ŚWIATOWEJ

Author(s): Wlodzislaw Zeidler / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2016

Wilhelm Wundt was one of those scientists and intellectualists, who had their own opinions on WWI even when it was just beginning. In the article the author wants to answer two questions. First, the answer the question concerning peculiarity of Wundt’s stance. Second, answer the question of inner consistency of his opinions i.e. his outlooks on war and his earlier and original viewpoints on philosophy and psychology (i.e. ethics or Volkerpsychologie). Unlike in previous studies, Wilhelm Wundt’s stance on war is characterized based on his three works: Über den wahrhaften Krieg (1914), Die Nationen und ihre Philosophie (1915) and Zur Lage (1916, the answer for „Polnische Blätter”). The inclusion of the third work, which for many decades was ignored by psychology historians (in Poland and in the other countries alike), is what makes this study distinct.

POLITICAL ATMOSPHERE IN DORPAT IN EMIL KRAEPELIN’S PERIOD

Author(s): Erki Tammiksaar / Language(s): English / Issue: 4/2016

The period the German psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin (1856–1926) spent in Dorpat (today Tartu) (1886–1891) had a great effect on his further career as a psychiatrist and psychologist and has been studied and written about in detail (Steinberg, Angermeyer 2001, Engstrom, Weber 2005, Engstrom, Engler 2015, Allik 2016, Engstrom 2016). Kraepelin described the life in Dorpat in his memoirs (Kraepelin 1987), where it follows that before going to Dorpat, he did not know that Germans were in a minority in the Baltic provinces of the Russian empire. Nor did he know anything about the local political atmosphere and what attitude to take towards it as a national of the German state. In 2003, a special book, “Emil Kraepelin in Dorpat, 1886–1891” (Burgmair, Engstrom, Hirschmüller, Weber, 2003), based on the sources available in the Estonian archives was published, which is a valuable addition to the personal memories of Kraepelin. However, it was very difficult for the authors of the book, historians of psychiatry, to estimate the role of Dorpat in the life of Kraepelin. The few Baltic German studies they used (Gernet 1902, Tobien 1930) and memoirs (Hoerschelmann 1926, Hueck-Dehio 1953) do not provide an objective picture of the tense situation in Dorpat on the eve of Russification, the more so that the subject of those sources was quite different. The aim of this article is to shed light on the political atmosphere surrounding Kraepelin in Dorpat and his reactions to it.

Prezentacja „Prezentacji”

Author(s): Tomasz Swoboda / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 7/2016

Gilles Deleuze believed that Sacher-Masoch had a unique role to play. He recognized Sacher-Masoch as a great writer while masochism was for him a particularly important psychosocial feature of modernity – much more complex than a simple opposite of sadism. Reenacting and exposing his symbolic castration, the masochist subverts the traditional version of cultural identity since he shows that it comes from the Other and the Other gives it meaning. The essay places Deleuze reading Sacher-Masoch in the context of the literature of transgression and the twentieth-century changes in the understanding of masochism and human sexuality in general.

Prezentacja Sacher-Masocha

Chłód i okrucieństwo

Author(s): Gilles Deleuze / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 7/2016

First polish translation of classic essay by Gilles Deleuze.

Profesor Gościmierz Geras – wspomnienie i wstęp do zrozumienia zagadnień z obszaru psychologii penitencjarnej

Author(s): Beata Pastwa-Wojciechowska / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2016

Celem prezentowanego artykułu jest zapoznanie Czytelnika z dorobkiem naukowym z zakresu psychologii penitencjarnej Profesora Gościmierza Gerasa i jego znaczenia oraz wpływu na dalszy rozwój naszej wiedzy o naturze człowieka. Spostrzeżenia, koncepcje i teorie wypracowane m.in. przez Profesora nadal powinny być inspiracją do badań z uwzględnieniem współczesnej wiedzy, ale także poszanowaniem tej, która została wcześniej wypracowana. Wydaje się, że poznanie człowieka w sytuacjach ekstremalnych czy też trudnych jest wciąż obszarem poszukiwań, w którym brakuje całościowego spojrzenia na jego funkcjonowanie. Często patrzymy na osadzonych przez kontekst czynności lub zadań, które mamy wykonać, bez szerszego poznania mechanizmów leżących u ich podłoża. Poznając to, co określamy jako patologiczne odnajdujemy również drogę do normalności a nawet heroizmu.

Professor Gościmierz Geras – Memory and Introduction to Understanding Issues in the Area of Correctional Psychology

Author(s): Beata Pastwa-Wojciechowska / Language(s): English / Issue: 1/2016

The aim of this article is to promote Professor Gościmierz Geras’ contribution to scientific research on correctional psychology and his impact on the further development of our general knowledge on human nature. Insights, concepts and theories developed, among others, by the Professor, should continue to be the source of inspiration for studies based on updated knowledge, but also respecting previous contributions. Finding out about man in extreme or unusual circumstances still seems to be a challenge if one does not look at human actions holistically. We perceive prisoners too often from the narrow context of tasks and functions without the broader knowledge of mechanisms which are at the root of their actions. Getting to know what we define as pathological, we also find the path to the healthy norm and even heroism.