ABSTRACT
Psychoanalysts have long been curious, enamoured, and divided about the role culture plays in analytic treatment. Most often analysts employ an outdated notion of culture, one long abandoned by anthropologists. This chapter presents the role cultural differences play in analysis or psychodynamic psychotherapy. In these arenas the consensus of China American Psychoanalytic Alliance (CAPA) analysts and therapists is that cultural difference does not alter the psychoanalytic process. Psychoanalysis concerns itself with meaning not with external form. The chapter discusses the work of the CAPA and the problem of both CAPA therapist’s patient and/or the CAPA supervisee’s patient demanding advice and quick solutions. The discussion of cross-cultural analyses has become a cottage industry as analysis has moved to Asia and to China. The chapter presents a composite of clinical findings from a series of consultations the author conducted in China.
