Browsing by Author "Stein, Joanne"

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    Interpretation and explanation in psychoanalysis
    (1991) Stein, Joanne
    By exploring the logical status of the psychoanalytic object of investigation, the compromise-formation, this dissertation suggests that although Freud's defence of Psychoanalysis as a natural science has been legitimately rejected as problematic, the reconstrual of Psychoanalysis as an interpretive or hermeneutic knowledge is likewise inappropriate to the psychoanalytic object. On the basis of the work of Donald Davidson and Arthur Dante, it is argued instead that the nature and status of Psychoanalysis as a knowledge is best understood and assessed in terms of a third alternative provided by the historical epistemology germane to the psychoanalytic object. In this way, the case against Psychoanalysis as a natural science is granted, while psychoanalytic epistemology is nevertheless defended as explanatory rather than interpretive.
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    What's news: perspectives on HIV/AIDS advocacy in the South African print media
    (National Inquiry Services Centre, 2003) Stein, Joanne
    This paper explores stakeholders' views regarding the question of whether HIV/AIDS coverage in the South African media should be the product of media advocacy and a proactive agenda for contributing to social change. Twenty-seven newspaper editors, journalists and other key stakeholders with a vested interest in HIV/AIDS coverage in the print media were interviewed during the course of 2002. Two overriding issues were raised by informants for consideration. These were, firstly, the need to balance the journalistic objectives of (a) advocacy and (b) neutrality and, secondly, the need to balance the objectives of (a) advocacy and (b) news value and profitability. Findings suggest that reticence regarding the adoption of an explicit advocacy role regarding HIV/AIDS has much to do with the media's evolving relationship with the post-apartheid government and its controversial approach to HIV/AIDS.
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    Working with Ambivalence: Finding a Positive Identity for HIV/AIDS in South Africa.
    (2003) Soskolne, Talia; Stein, Joanne; Gibson, Kerry
    Psychoanalytic theory draws attention to the way in which a positive identity can be asserted as a defence against underlying anxieties. Focusing specifically on the South African context, this paper highlights the way in which people attempt to forge a positive self-concept in the face of a stigmatised and self threatening HIV identity. In-depth interviews were conducted with twelve women living with HIV in a black South African township. Discursive and psychoanalytic understandings were used to explore the emotional experience of HIV/AIDS and its impact on both the participants of the study and ourselves as researchers. We elucidate the process by which our interviewees vacillated between conflicting notions of health and sickness; empowerment and disempowerment; strength and weakness; purity and contagion; and death and continuity. We argue that a more resilient self can be formed through recognition of both the positive and negative implications of an HIV diagnosis. We also maintain that it is necessary to move beyond the individualizing tendencies of mainstream psychology to recognise the social context and discursive practices which exacerbate stigma and influence the experience of those living with HIV/AIDS.