ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that psychoanalysis in education is anything but relational. A common rebuttal to relational psychoanalytic assertions is that all of contemporary psychoanalysis is relational. In this chapter, I refute that charge. Moreover, I attribute the marginalised position of psychoanalytic thought in education to its classical leanings and the problems associated with accessible discourse and a tendency to focus on trauma (the suppression of instincts) to the neglect of joy in learning. Neuroscience joins relational psychoanalytic thought to paint a different, more hopeful, image of what can happen in schooling practice.
