Masks and faces in analysis at the time of pandemic

Journal title STUDI JUNGHIANI
Author/s Silvia Presciuttini
Publishing Year 2022 Issue 2021/54
Language Italian Pages 16 P. 85-100 File size 0 KB
DOI 10.3280/jun54-2021oa13064
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The “health emergency” forces analysts to search unusual modalities in order to continue the analysis. The article focuses particularly on changes brought in the setting by the presence of sanitary mask, describing an excursus that, from the theme of “mask” in the collective uses of human cultures, takes place through the Jungian concept of Persona, as opposed to the theme of “face” as an authentic image of the self. A clinical example illustrates how the sanitary mask introduces criticalities in the setting, in its hindering the communication of emotions. In the absence of a transformative processing of concrete data, “taking off their mask” can also lead to a destabilizing encounter. In times of darkness and confusion in analysis, the analyst experiences that kind of “unconscious identity” between therapist and patient that Jung called Nigredo. Then the subtle body acquires characters of gravity, heaviness, thickness, that damage its transformative quality. 

Keywords: ; “Health emergency”; Mask; Persona; Face; Taking off the Mask; Uncanny; Nigredo

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Silvia Presciuttini, Maschere e volti nel setting ai tempi della pandemia in "STUDI JUNGHIANI" 54/2021, pp 85-100, DOI: 10.3280/jun54-2021oa13064