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THE NEGRO AND PSYCHOPATHOLOGY

Psychoanalytic schools have studied the neurotic reactions that
arise among certain groups, in certain areas of civilization. In
response to the requirements of dialectic, one should investigate
the extent to which the conclusions of Freud or of Adler can be
applied to the effort to understand the man of color’s view of
the world.
It can never be suffi ciently emphasized that psychoanalysis sets
as its task the understanding of given behavior patterns—within
the specifi c group represented by the family. When the problem
is a neurosis experienced by an adult, the analyst’s task is to
uncover in the new psychic structure an analogy with certain
infantile elements, a repetition, a duplication of confl icts that owe
their origin to the essence of the family constellation. In every
case the analyst clings to the concept of the family as a “psychic
circumstance and object.” 1
Here, however, the evidence is going to be particularly
complicated. In Europe the family represents in effect a certain
fashion in which the world presents itself to the child. There
are close connections between the structure of the family and
the structure of the nation. Militarization and the centraliza-
tion of authority in a country automatically entail a resurgence
of the authority of the father. In Europe and in every country
characterized as civilized or civilizing, the family is a miniature
of the nation. As the child emerges from the shadow of his
parents, he finds himself once more among the same laws,
the same principles, the same values. A normal child that has

1. Jacques Lacan, “Le complèxe, facteur concret de la psychologie familiale,”
Encyclopédie française, 8–40, 5.

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