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Updated: May 16, 2026
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Published on: November 2, 2012
Recognition in Winnicott's "The Use of an Object and Relating Through Identifications"
Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association
|May 31, 2025
Summary
Winnicott
Area of Science:
- Psychoanalytic theory
- Developmental psychology
- Object relations theory
Background:
- Donald Winnicott's seminal essay, "The Use of an Object and Relating Through Identifications," challenges traditional views on infant aggression.
- It explores the infant's innate drive to destroy the object and the mother's survival as crucial for developing a sense of reality.
Purpose of the Study:
- To re-examine Winnicott's concepts of destruction, relating, and use in psychoanalytic literature.
- To highlight the significance of reciprocal destruction and alteration in the transition from omnipotent relating to mature object use.
- To underscore the metapsychological importance of recognition in therapeutic action.
Main Methods:
- Conceptual analysis of Winnicott's essay.
- Exploration of psychoanalytic and philosophical concepts (e.g., Hegel's dialectic, Nancy's alteration).
- Reinterpretation of Winnicott's key terms: destruction, relating, and use.
Main Results:
- Destruction, viewed as an expression of love and vitality, is essential for establishing a sense of reality.
- Reciprocal destruction and mutual alteration are necessary for moving from "relating" to "use."
- Recognition is a complex, non-conscious process vital for psychological development and therapeutic action.
Conclusions:
- Winnicott's essay offers enduring insights into the infant's psychological development and the nature of object relations.
- The concepts of destruction and recognition are central to understanding subjectivity and therapeutic processes.
- Understanding recognition beyond conscious acts is crucial for psychoanalytic practice.
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