Struttura e funzione tra psicoanalisi e fenomenologia

Freudian psychoanalysis develops the organization of the psyche according to two “topics:” the first, which highlights the types of processes and representational contents, has a functional character, while the second, which focuses on the different “systems” of the psychic apparatus, has a structural character. The two topics can be spatially visualized through two kinds of representations: projective and conformal. This Freudian distinction, however, is criticized by phenomenological psychology – particularly by Binswanger – due to its naturalistic assumptions and its inability to provide complete structural relevance to the dynamic and dialectical features of psychic life. In response, phenomenology develops an authentic topology of lived experience according to a conformal space-time model, in which curvatures and points of accumulation assume prominence as different modes of human being in the world. Thus, the different forms of psychic suffering correspond to the cracks and gaps that are present in the mundane structuring of the individual’s “life space.”