Introduction
I am writing an essay comparing and contrasting the academic discipline of social anthropology with the therapeutic school of process work. I look at the characteristics of both and then ask whether either is fit for pupouse for making decisions about how to exist in the world, for individuals, organisations and governments. I then make recommendations for the deployment of both disciplines and suggest a way for the knowledge of anthropology to be read across to process work and vice versa. I draw on some of my own experience with psychiatry to analyse process work , which is a form of therapy.
The two disciplines
I wanted to write more of a rambling essay about the links certain important cultural ideas such as anthropology and something called ‘process work’.
A warning…this essay is quite chatty and rambling and not really structured like an academic essay.
Anthropology is a well established (if vexed) discipline dedicated to the study of human variety mainly through the methodology of ethnography or participant observation. In lay persons terms it was when an anthropologist would go live with a tribe in (for example) sub-saharan Africa for an extended period and understand their ways. Anthropology is vexed because most western anthropologists adopt various Kama Sutra positions of contrition when it comes to anthropology’s close relationship with imperialism and colonisation.
Process work by contrast is a form of psychotherapy with roots in Jungian psychoanalysis. Process work has centres in Switzerland and the United States. Jung has his own detractors who claim Jung personally was deeply anti semitic and trying to establish a cult.
The main thing I think which links the two disciplines is the emphasis on aspects of life that are generally ignored, unspoken or so familiar that we don’t even notice them anymore.
Both disciplines heavily use the written word and there is a certain ‘poetics’ to both disciplines. Both are concerned with the full spectrum diversity of human experience and both have a certain ‘performative’ or ‘storytime’ quality.
Both process workers and ethnographers produce gorgeous accounts of cultural diversity rooted in locality and specificity. Both use language to illustrate the hidden or magical dimensions that make the world tick.
Both are concerned with the big issues facing humanity such as racism, sexism and sustainability. I think both are probably left liberal in their slant.
Both disciplines as I mentioned are riddled like a piece of Swiss cheese with controversy. The 2011 film ‘A Dangerous Method’ dramatized Jung’s romantic relationships with his clients. Numerous anthropologists have been accused of taking advantage of opportunities for sexual tourism in the field, the most famous of which probably being Margaret Mead and her perchance for young Polynesian women.
When you actually analyse it anthropology itself is so mired in sexual impropriety and the injustice of enslavement and colonialism that it makes you wonder whether there is anything worth salvaging at all? Similarly Jungian studies provokes hostile reactions from the scientific community as Jungians discuss the ‘uncanny’ aspects of life. Jungian culture has probably considerably fed the new age publishing industry and self help publishing industry. Again Jung as a figure is so controversial people find it hard to rely on anything he said and then there are the Nazi links. Jung tried to make accommodations with the Nazis to protect his nascent therapeutic school.
In terms pf psychoanalysis, Jungian therapy seems to be a niche pursuit but as I mentioned Jungian ideas are recycled through the self help publishing industry, yoga industry, new age wellness industry, speakers such as Deepak Chopra, Pema Chodron and Instagram posts.
Globally anthropology departments keep minting fresh BA’s, MA’s and Phd’s. As part of the liberal cannon they are being constantly cut back like an overgrown rose bush but seem to keep sporuting and spreading ethnography and other post modern ideas to other disciplines.
From my personal perspective the anthropological focus on the oppressed or subaltern areas of society has fed into anthropology being a branch of cultural Marxism. The emphasis on gift economies and novel economists like Karl Polyani underscore how many anthropologists now espouse some form of revolutionary change in society, never mind those fresh minted PhDs who can’t find teaching contracts. Anthropology seems to me to be a sub-set of the global cultural left. With advocates like David Harvey, Noam Chomsky and Naomi Klein.
Process work is also largely indistinguishable from a glut of other new age publishing. The maverick duo of Arnie and Amy Mindell seem to sit at the apex of the process work pyramid, which was founded by Arnie Mindell. The International School of process work is based in Portland Oregon and issues qualifications in psychotherapy.
I’ve heard anecdotally that process work therapy can be harmful rather than helpful.
There is a boom in online Zoom & Skype therapy and schools like the process work Institute feed a need for these e-therapists to have some kind of qualification.
In my experience therapy at a distance is not very helpful. I even go as far as to question whether the power balance inherent in therapy is warranted at all. On a smaller scale it reflects the disparity between observer and observed in social anthropology.
I find process work texts very interesting. As I mentioned before they look at the unseen, wacky or lesser known aspects and dimensions of life. I wonder whether the ‘performativity’ of therapy and its storytime element is entertaining but flawed.
I would like to contrast process work with psychiatry. I personally rely on treatment from a medical psychiatrist which is to some degree measurable and quantifiable. All of my education in anthropology (I have an anthropology degree from Manchester University). My education is crying out for the rich stories to be true but I find in the sphere of the treatment of bipolar process work fails. What works is medical science as imperfect as it is. Psychiatry also has its fictions such as the myth of the chemical imbalance. But I guess its like being held hostage by a slightly more professional outfit.
Also I think the medical profession has a better established system of ethics and checks and balances than either anthropology or process work. This is only my own observation from personal experience.
I find doctors incredibly infuriating people but process work and anthropology are slippery in the extreme. They seem to be outgrowths of the 1960s counter culture. Again I love Ginsberg and Pink Floyd and I want the counter culture to be the answer. But I feel like untrammeled counter culture leads to a kind of quasi-Marxist hell. Also the amount of drugs consumed by the participants is worrying.
I feel like the intellectual messiness and double think of anthropology and process work lead to sloppy political thinking and indoctrination into Marxism or Buddhism. Both of which I find to be quagmires of different sorts.
I love poetry and creativity but I think we have to keep the creative thinking within the sphere of the arts and leave law, engineering and social sciences to harder heads. I hate saying this but I feel the ‘woo’ ‘woo’ thinking of anthropology and process work are the road to hell. I don’t want them to be but I think they might be.
Social sciences are always trying to ‘deconstruct’ society which I think in itself is problematic.
I am not really calling for intellectual conservatism. Some of my favourite writers are Blake, Hafiz and Dickenson who were kaleidoscopic. I just feel like anthropology and process work as practices open doors which once opened can’t be shut. They are like Pandora’s boxes maybe without the ‘hope’.
I don’t like writing about ‘cultural Marxism’ but I just observe how sociological critique often gets high jacked by illiberal forces, authoritarians of the left and right.
Maybe anthropology and process work would be best relegated to the arts. Lots of artists have found fruitful energy and insights in Jung’s work. Give teachers of MFA’s a copy of Jung and a copy of Tristes Tropiques by Levi Strauss and leave the social sciences to the lab rats.
Both disciplines have an extensive literature but probably needs some integrating. Anthropologists and process workers use terminology quite differently. Anthropology is definitely more technical but there is a lot an ordinary reader can gain from both. I suggest maybe the works of Arnold Mindell could be summarised and interpreted for an anthropological audience.
Conclusion
My conclusion is that both process work and anthropology should abandon the pretence of being scientific. There is a certain amount of integration that could be done to import and export ideas between the two disciplines. Both regard themselves as ‘meta’ sciences that overlook and integrate other branches of human knowledge. Process work has the ‘Tao’ or ‘Taoism’ at its centre which might infuriate atheist anthropologists. I think there is a lot of scope for both disciplines to be summarised and to become creative prompts for artists.
Film – 2011 – ‘A Dangerous Method’