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Unconscious Misogyny: Exploring Its Impact in Therapeutic Settings: Video Course

Unconscious Misogyny: Exploring Its Impact in Therapeutic Settings: Video Course
‘Don’t fall into the trap of being a strident, strong woman or you won’t get on well.’
When well-meaning, everyday remarks like this one continue to be the lived experience of a woman therapist in today’s world (true story shared by the speaker), it is time to seriously reflect on the unconscious misogyny that continues or live in plain sight and gets introjected down through societal attitudes, media and political bias. More importantly, misogyny continues to negatively affect women, both therapists and clients, mentally and emotionally, hampering both their personal and professional lives.
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£ 69.00

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Unconscious misogyny can leave a lasting impact on the women who experience it, contributing to poorer mental health and well-being. They have an increased risk of developing mental health conditions such as depression, lower life satisfaction, decreased cognitive function, psychological distress and an overall poorer self-rated health. (CAMFT)
When minorities, trans people, and other members of the LGBTQIA+ identify as women, the misogyny they may face could be more extreme. The misogyny that a black woman experiences, for example, may be more drastic than what her white counterpart might face due to the added layer of racism.
The course will be bringing misogyny in psychotherapy into sharp focus, thinking about unconscious misogynistic attitudes, the role of blame on the mother, presumptions about gender roles, the absence of writing and training about stereotypical female development such as menarche, menstruation and menopause. It will also provide a space to reflect on the impact of unconscious misogyny in psychotherapy and to examine our own misogynistic introject.
This timely course invites us to start by thinking about how women have been and continue to be seen and treated in psychoanalysis; to understand the historic impact and explore the current implications for clinical treatment for all genders. In psychoanalysis, misogyny lives seemingly above and beyond the usual conventions of workplace etiquette or even a vague awareness of sexism. Ironically for a field where the main currency is reflection, the different treatment of women is bypassed as it is inbuilt in psychoanalysis. It is commonplace in psychoanalytic literature and in the presentation of case studies for:
- A description of the usually female analysand’s attractiveness to be given as a diagnosis rather than an opinion,
- For the word ‘feminine’ to be used as a synonym for submission
- For psychosexual development to miss the glaringly obviously important stages of menarche
- For a child’s development to be modelled on the theory of male psychosexual development as described by Freud and
- For the fundamental experiences of pregnancy, childbirth and menopause to continue to be overlooked
This course addresses these issues to give a contemporary understanding of the role unconscious misogyny plays in psychotherapy and the importance of understanding misogynistic enactments and how it can be addressed in clinical practice. Seems paradoxical, but women can also perpetuate misogynistic attitudes through internalised misogyny. When as women, we unconsciously observe and absorb media depictions and societal beliefs about misogyny, see it in action in our everyday life (microaggressions, subtle dismissal of opinions) and experience the devaluation of women’s skills, we may eventually internalise those beliefs — possibly applying them to ourselves and other women. And yet, we may be completely unaware of our blind spot.
Understanding the impact of unconscious misogyny on mental health will hopefully help us to create healthier and more inclusive thought patterns and attitudes for everyone across the gender and orientation spectrum in future, starting in the present.
This course which is suitable for psychotherapists, counsellors, supervisors, psychologists and psychoanalysts, will look at the history of misogyny in psychoanalysis and core theoretical psychoanalytic concepts such as the Oedipus Complex and tracing these origins to their impact on contemporary psychotherapy practice and theory. Through the use of a case study we shall be exploring how misogyny is enacted in psychological therapies and the trauma this causes, repeating cycles of misogynistic abuse.
Specifically, we will look at:
- The concept of the misogynistic introject
- Unpacking how living in patriarchal societies means that misogyny is internalised by everyone.
- How misogyny may be presented in a clinical work
- The role of supervision in these enactments
Living in a patriarchal society, misogyny has an impact on people of all genders from inequality in the workplace to access to health care. This impact is increased for people who are not white, heterosexual, neurotypical and/or from a socio-economic advantaged background. If this is not acknowledged within the therapeutic context there is a risk of further discrimination and potentially retraumatizing the client. As therapists, we cannot just examine our own outlook but also create a non-judgmental space by:
- Increasing our own self-awareness of misogynistic attitudes and enactments
- Developing a questioning attitude when using core psychoanalytic theories that were written from a phallocentric viewpoint
Learning Objectives:
- Discuss the history of misogyny as it has become institutionalized in psychoanalysis and explain the theory of Misogyny from a Winnicottian perspective
- Discuss the current context of misogyny in psychoanalysis and the interplay of societal attitudes with training and practicing in psychoanalysis / psychotherapy
- Analyse your own internalized misogyny and how this may be impacting on sense of self, especially in clinical contexts
© nscience UK, 2024 / 25
What's included in this course
- Presented by world-class speaker(s)
- Handouts and video recording
- 3 hrs of professionally produced lessons
- 1 year access to video recorded version
- CPD / CE Certificate
- Join from anywhere in the world
Learning objectives
- Discuss the history of misogyny as it has become institutionalized in psychoanalysis and explain the theory of Misogyny from a Winnicottian perspective
- Discuss the current context of misogyny in psychoanalysis and the interplay of societal attitudes with training and practicing in psychoanalysis / psychotherapy
- Analyse your own internalized misogyny and how this may be impacting on sense of self, especially in clinical contexts

Michaela Chamberlain trained at the Bowlby Centre and studied in the Psychoanalysis Unit at UCL. Shortly after qualifying at the Bowlby Centre in 2016, she started teaching Freud and Attachment Theory and became Chair of the Bowlby Centre. She worked as an honorary psychotherapist in two NHS Trusts for several years. She has presented clinical papers at public forums, lectures internationally and has been published in the British Journal of Psychotherapy, Attachment: New Directions in Psychotherapy and Relational Psychoanalysis, New Associations and The New Psychotherapist Magazine. Her book, Misogyny in Psychoanalysis, released in June 2022, explores the historical and current context of misogyny in psychoanalytic theory and clinical practice. She was invited to speak with Adam Phillips about her book at the Freud Museum London and was interviewed for New Books in Psychoanalysis.
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