ABSTRACT
This part introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters. The part introduces the “pronoun” as a decisive ordering principle of individual subjectivity and social discourse, is beautiful in its concision and clarity. It shows the idea of the collective self to be a somewhat reductionist misnomer, and prefer greatly the stance, quoted by Helena Klimova, of S. Karterud and W. N. Stone who declare: “Groups do not contain any supraindividual mind, but a supraindividual project. In a touching and clear sequence of personal vignettes, Klimova guides analysts through the developmental aspects of the individual “false self” in the interaction of a small girl with her mother and the identification with the aggressor which initiated it. The part highlights one aspect of treatment problems that could become central to future work: the question of prenatal, intrauterine experience as a matrix for such later mental phenomena.
