Seminars of the School

Foundations of Psychoanalysis_

Wednesdays 7.30pm – 9.00pm

Commencing Wednesday 26th February and running for 20 weeks, the Foundations of Psychoanalysis seminar returns in 2025 to provide participants with a rigorous working of the fundamental concepts underpinning Freudian and Lacanian theory and clinical practice. It forms an important component of the theoretical aspect of the training of analysts and the ongoing work of the analysts of the school.

The Seminar is also open to students, scholars and colleagues in related clinical fields, in recognition of the importance to psychoanalysis of its extension beyond the clinic.

Convenor: Julian Browne
P: 0407 299 145

The Seminar of the School_

First Saturday of the Month
12.00pm to 1.30pm

The Seminar of the School is held monthly and open to members of The Freudian School of Melbourne. Those from outside the School wishing to participate in the theoretical interrogation of Lacanian psychoanalysis are welcome to enquire about the School's Foundations of Psychoanalysis Seminar.

Convenor: Julian Browne
P: 0407 299 145

Psychoanalysis, Philosophy & Theology_

An appraisal of certain fundamental concepts in psychoanalysis and the way in which they are informed by and inform recurring questions in philosophy and theology across the realms of metaphysics, ontology, logic and ethics. 

Convenor: David Pereira, Analyst of the School
Ph. (03) 9690 3515

First Saturday of the month
10.30am - 12.00pm

My Barbaric Yawp

Third Tuesday of the month
7.00pm – 9.00pm, commencing March 19, 2024

“If we are sure that sexuality is present in action in the transference, it is in so far as at certain moments it is manifested in the open in the form of love..” Lacan, The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis

This year the Seminar continues to be interested in the symbiosis between writing and love, and with how this symbiosis might impinge on the practice of psychoanalysis.

Writing is understood as any practice which takes signifying articulation towards its materialisation as the letter. Love, taken as sign, is not to be understood. Nevertheless, to quote the poet Barbara Guest, “dreams [are] set by typography.”

The Seminar is structured around presentations which draw on the material practice of artists, in any field, including that of the presenters themselves. Each one, caught up in their own peculiar way in this symbiosis between love and writing, brings this psychoanalytic seminar to life.

Convenor: Peter Gunn, Analyst Member of the School
Ph. (03) 9347 1707

In Consideration of Anguish

Second Tuesday of every month
7.00 - 8.30pm commencing on February 13

The seminar will take place in Geelong

Could anxiety be the Toyota Camry of our days, as an interviewee on Radio National suggested—that is, the near-ubiquitous accompaniment of everyday life? Could anxiety even be an affect that guides us—or a signal, and if so, what does it alert us to?

This seminar commenced in 2021 and will continue to elaborate on and consider anxiety in another way than by regarding it as an illness or a disorder. Freud proposed it as a signal and in considering what it might alert us to, we will approach Jacques Lacan’s notion of a new kind of object, the object a. Located by Lacan between desire and jouissance, anxiety has a signal relation to both, thus including to the desire of the analyst operating in the transference. We will use the tenth seminar of Jacques Lacan, entitled Anguish, as a framework for our considerations, as well as other texts and matters raised in the clinic.

The seminar will take place in Geelong on the second Tuesday of every month, from 7.00-8.30pm, commencing on Tuesday February 13.

To attend the seminar or for further information, please contact one of the convenors.

Megan Williams, Analyst of the School
Ph. 0417728738

Tine Nørregaard, Analyst Member of the School
Ph. 0419150658 | ✉ email enquiry

Reading Seminars

The Lacan Reading Seminar: Seminar VIII Transference

These Seminars involve a close reading of foundational texts of Freud and Lacan with discussion of related clinical and theoretical topics.

Convenor: Linda Clifton, Analyst of the School
Ph. (+61) 0421 979 496

Last Saturday of the month
3.00pm – 5.00 pm