Some relations between Freudian psychoanalysis and ethical principles of knowledge of the self and care of the self

• Grant number: 12/06153-0
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Effective date (Start): July 01, 2012
• Effective date (End): March 31, 2015
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Philosophy - Epistemology
• Principal researcher: Luiz Roberto Monzani
• Grantee: Thiago Canonenco Naldinho
• Home Institution: Centro de Educação e Ciências Humanas (CECH). Universidade Federal de São Carlos (UFSCAR). São Carlos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Our research proposal focus on the possibility of considering psychoanalysis as a form of spirituality, in other words, an amalgam consisting of a practice and a theoretical speech which would allow the subject to make modifications in himself/herself so as to access the truth, and make up a way of life consonant with the truth. In order to do so, we have started from some of Foucault's assertions - which appeared in his last great pivotal question (ethics). These statements describe the presence, in the center of psychoanalysis, of the same subjects which had guided the millenarian tradition of spirituality prevailing among the ancient Greek-Hellenistic-Romans. Our research intends, therefore, to investigate how - according to Freud - the relations between the subject and truth occur in a psychoanalytic experience. Freud is considered by Foucault as one of the few who assumed the existence of a spirituality trait in psychoanalysis. To sum up, we intend to find out if psychoanalysis can be thought as a form of spirituality that would enable the subject - through an ascetic work on him/herself - to access the truth, which would bring about a change in the subject's life style. (AU)