Somatics And Criticism

Somatics and Social Criticism Tom S. Tabaczynski

I’ve been reading G. H. Mead and then also Herbert Marcuse and I find somatics to fit in with these sorts of approaches. Mead seems to be a natural place to look for a philosophical framework for thinking about somatics. While sympathetic to certain aspects of Shusterman’s approach but I’m not really well versed in his style of pragmatism which connects Dewey with Rorty, Wittgenstein, and constructivism (I guess??) so have no clear critical view of its effectiveness but the idea of ’somaesthetics’ seems worth exploring. But Shusterman’s pragmatism seems quite different from Mead’s, and I am interested in reviving Mead’s naturalism. The other literature that I find interesting is critical theory’s interest in sexuality, aestheics, and embodiment in thinking about mass culture, consumerism, monopoly capitalism, etc. I like Marcuse’s style of analysis and share his interest in a ‘concrete philosophy’. Unless we’re talking psychology it seems that the interest of somatics is in relation to issues of modernity, liberation, social transformation, etc. So I think that intellectually speaking it has this dual background, in pragmatism, esp. the ‘motor’ psychology of dewey and mead, and in Marxist social criticism.

Somatics and psychotherapy Somatic education is connected to psychoanalysis through practices such as body psychotherapy. Nonetheless, it is much more grounded in pragmatist psychology than psychoanalysis. This seems to limit how far it can draw on European critical social theory for wider philosophical and critical (ie., political) implications. It is through the concept of sexuality or Eros that psychoanalysis acquires its political and philosophical edge through its concepts of repression and of culture-as-sublimation. The psychoanalytic model seems to rely heavily on the hydraulic model of libidinal psychic energy. Feldenkrais however rejects this model on theoretical grounds, and insists that the system does not allow for a conception in terms of energy, but only in terms of action and tension. There is no energy to be expelled but only tension and the release from tension. This generates a problem in so far as Feldenkrais and somatic education in general seeks to acquire political and philosophical significance, in that it moves towards the pragmatist conception of action that has not generates the critical edge of Marxism and psychoanalysis. Marxist and social theoretical analysis of capitalism draw heavily on the notions of economic oppression and sexual repression in the production of the historical forms of capitalism and repressive forms of bourgeois liberation and individualism. Marcuse fundamental contention is that Western art provides the main means of reconciling the bourgeois concepts of individual liberation with the unfreedom and repression that is the reality of the capitalist system of production and distribution.

The Marxist credentials of critical theory are much stronger than those of pragmatism, it seems. So the question is then how can somatic education draw on the psychoanalytic model for its critical edge when it rejects what apparently is its critical tenet, namely, the conception of sexuality in terms of psychic energy, and its insistence on the centrality of sexuality. Somatic education does not seem to focus on sexuality over and above other forms of expertise. Yet the Reichian model of sex economy at least claims to offer the possibility of a historical analysis of patriarchy, repression, and therefore a historical analysis of the sources of capitalism and its forms of sexual repression, in the history of patriarchy in general, as the history of sexual repression within the family. Alternatively, it offers, in Marcuse, the possibility of an analysis of the contradictions and psychological basis of the maintenance of capitalist forms of domination in Western forms of art that enable the reconciliation of the bourgeois values of liberation and the repressive realities of capitalist modes of production. The question then is whether these putative gains can be retained or reconstructed within a psychological model that dispenses with the energy metaphor in favour of a tension-reduction model of the psychosomatic system. Certainly Feldenkrais as well as the other somatic educators seek to cover the ground that has been traditionally claimed by psychoanalysis, including neurosis and sexuality. But it seems at least on the surface that neither pragmatism nor somatic education necessitate the viewing of sexuality and sexual repression as a central function. Nonetheless, it does seem that the Reichian move from the orthodox Freudian model of the psychic system towards one in terms of the body or soma does move in the direction of the somatic education model, the question then being whether it is necessary to retain the hydraulic/energy metaphor in order to retain the insights and in particular the critical edge of psychoanalysis. Well, one response that does seem to invite itself is that in fact critical theory does need to broaden its concept of psychic energy such that it generalizes being genital sexuality, as is clear in the case of Marcuse, so as to account for the significance of art in the maintenance of the capitalist forms of repression and domination. Here it is the desexualisation, or desensualisation, of the body, that is, removing bodily or sensual pleasure as a precondition of happiness, and its replacement with a disembodied or non-embodied forms of happiness that are found in the cognitive-aesthetic relation to art, providing the individual with momentary and transient bouts of liberation and happiness within an unhappy reality, that forms the central historical mechanism for reconciling the ideals of liberation with a repressive reality. The question then is whether the hydraulic model with its energy metaphor does not become redundant and unnecessary, that is, whether it is possible to make that argument without the conceptual baggage of psychoanalysism, that is, whether the tension-release model might not do just as well. There are really two connected claims being made by critical theory, namely, the insistence on the quantitative model of sexuality, and the insistence on the centrality of sexuality in social repression. These seem to be connected in some way. But fundamentally sexual energy becomes generalized as being psychic energy in general. Culture provides for the sublimated means of releasing this sexual energy, but in the end it is simple genital sexuality that provides the ultimate means of sexual gratification and release of the dammed up psychic energy. Pragmatism, and even somatic education, accepts the centrality of sexuality in a certain sense which at least superficially seems weaker, in the sense that sexual differentiation is quite

fundamental to the human species and a basic instinct. There are a couple of issues that arise for psychoanalysis: the question of accounting for the neuroses; and the attempt to explain neuroses in terms of the need to repress sexuality in civilized society. In this respect somatic education, and Feldenkrais in particular, seek to provide a developmental model, suggesting that failure of development, which we may view in terms of the failure to acquire competence or expertise in some critical domain of life, leads to regression or immaturity. On the other hand, there is the question whether the quantitative model of sexuality really makes that much difference, or whether in fact the two models are incommensurate. Both seek to account for sexual dysfunction within the current social context. What the psychoanalytic model seems to offer is a broader philosophical framework which places sexuality at the centre as an explanatory construct. Somatic education on the other hand tends to emphasise movement in general, rather than specifically sexuality, as the domain of inquiry and improvement. Still, Feldenkrais seeks to draw conceptual connections between somatic education and psychoanalysis, so lets look at that. Reconciling somatic education and psychoanalysis A good amount of Feldenkrais’s writing seems to be concerned as much about somatic practice as with reconciliation with psychoanalytic and critical thought. Wilhelm Reich and the body psychotherapy paradigm would be figure in this respect. Somatic education points to the idea that the body psychotherapy model can be adopted with all of its critical substance but without the dubious science (esp., the psychic energy metaphor). The strategy seems to be to take the pragmatist psychological model and to develop it (esp. the tension-release metaphor) as an alternative basis for the somatic reconception of psychoanalysis. What psychoanalysis and critical social theory gains is a more scientifically respectable basis in pragmatist behaviourism, and what somatic education and pragmatism gains is the resources of critical theory. The question is whether this can succeeds, that is, whether Feldenkrais’ attempt at downplaying the differences are in fact convincing. There seems to be at least two critical elements that need addressing. The first is the practice side of psychoanalysis that deals with neuroses. On this side somatic education needs to show how it deals with the problem of neurosis, and the proposal is to look at this in terms of development and regression. The second is the theoretical side of psychoanalysis, which gives it its critical edge. On this side psychoanalysis posits civilization as emerging out of the repression of natural impulses, in particular, the repression of sexuality. Now, here we need to look at the theoretical side of orthodox psychoanalytic theory against the background of interpretive social psychology or Volkerpsychologie of Wilhelm Wundt. Freud sees psychoanalysis as essentially social psychology, that is, as interpretive. His emphasis on sexuality is drawn from his psychoanalytic practice and generalized in terms of an interpretation of art and literature. In this he moves in the direction of anthropology. On the other side of the divide we have people like the anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski who sees social structures in essentially functional terms. Dewey’s paper on anthropology reflects this and draws further implications for the processes of education. The tone of these writings is that the survival of the group demands the reproduction of certain predispositions and in particular certain forms of expertise

that ensure the preservation and survival of the group. Malinowski makes a strong distinction between the religious or sacred and the non-religious or profane social function. In matters of expertise the native is pragmatic and exercises quasi-scientific modes of reasoning. It is possible to clearly distinguish the spiritual domain and the pragmatic domain. In the latter the native needs to exercise practical reasoning and ensure the reproduction of expertise, something that would not presumably be compatible with the sacred domain which demands unquestioning commitment to the group. Feldenkrais perhaps is equivocal in his approbation of social criticism on the sort of grounds that we might find in say Marcuse. If we for example take Marcuse’s strategy for explaining the psychological basis of capitalism in terms of bourgeois aesthetics, the theme is that the psychological basis of capitalism is illusory inner liberation without real outer freedom. Marcuse develops the Marxist interpretation of Hegel in terms of the idea that outer freedom demands that the inner impulse is reflected in social institutions, whereas liberalism provides for inner liberation through bourgeois forms of cultural production within the context of the chaos of the marketplace which destroys the human ecology and the possibility of guarantees of outward bodily satisfaction. Real bodily consummations are vitiated by the tyranny of the marketplace that opposes the interests of the individual to those of the market place and of the requirements of mass consumption, that is, to the need of the market to sustain overconsumption. The market has no interest in the attainment of bodily satisfaction and the destruction of striving, but rather the opposite, its interest is in sustaining social mobility and the creation of artificial needs. It is only in the sphere of high art that the individual achieves immediate yet momentary satisfaction, or at least its promise. The conception of freedom in Feldenkrais is primarly based in the notion of the soma, movement, and the anti-gravity righting mechanisms. It is articulated in terms of spontaneity and choice of action. It is based around the notions of posture and motion or movement. Spontaneous movement is defined in terms of freedom from compulsion, and compulsion is associated with the notions of culture and society. So Feldenkrais seems to imply a kind of foundationalism in that he invokes the notion that there is a basic system that provides from free action and free choice, and that freedom here implies freedom from social compulsion. Social compulsion is associated with anxiety, and hence with the fear of falling. Freedom and spontaneity are further associated with achievement, which is exemplified in the arts. The question then is whether there is any relation between the two frameworks for thinking about art and cultural mediation in relation to freedom and spontaneity. There are parallels, points of contact, and some overlapping areas of concern, but there remains the question as to the motivation behind Feldenkrais’s interest in psychoanalysis and issues of freedom. On the surface at least he seems to be grounded firmly within the framework of pragmatist empiricism. So the question is whether there is any interest in Marxist social criticism, or whether there are other reasons for reconstructing the relation with psychoanalysis. Certainly the concern with the issues of freedom form a significant point of contact. But the critical theory’s concern with freedom concerns primarily the historical analysis of the processes whereby a society built around the overt ideals of freedom and happiness leads to an actual unfreedom and unhappiness due to the enslavement by market forces, and the concern here is the role that art and cultural production plays in the creation of the contradictions of capitalist society. There is the question therefore whether somatic

education is critical and therefore revolutionary or not, and whet this is Feldenkrais’s concern at all. Whatever the case may be, it is clear that Feldenkrais wants to see somatic education as continuous with psychoanalysis, as providing a further elaboration of that, rather than viewing it as a competing alternative paradigm. This may help its Marxist and critical credentials as a revolutionary technique. Viewed in this way somatic education provides a further elaboration of the psychoanalysis rather than a complete paradigm shift. If that is the case then, in so far as psychoanalysis is viewed at the level of theory as revolutionary and critical, then presumably somatic education must also accept this burden. The means of achieving this reconciliation is in terms of the notions of growth, development, and of regression due to failure of development. Neurosis is identified in terms of anxiety, growth and development are idenfied with art and spontaneity. The question then is whether this succeeds in connecting the two traditions. At least we can say that in so far as the Reichian body armouring and repression are critical concepts, the somatic education in terms of tension and anxiety ought to be able to inherit this theoretical function, so that tension can be associated with repression and oppression. I would further suggest that this can be elaborated in terms of the concept of a ‘politics of uncertainty’.