Faculty of Letters

In this introductory article to this special section, we draw attention to the many faces that Kohut introduced with respect to what we now see as the multifaceted notion of twinship. We tease out and describe seven faces: (1) twinship as something between merger and mirroring, (2) twinship as a process of mutual finding, (3) twinship as a sense of belonging, (4) twinship as a way of passing on talents and skills to the next generation, (5) twinship in silent communication, (6) twinship as a sense of being a human among other human beings, and (7) twinship in trauma. We identify the faces in Kohut's writings and show their relevance to Kohut's personal history. In this way, we support Atwood and Stolorow's (1979) argument that a theory of psychoanalysis and the theorist's personal life influence each other. We conclude that what may have looked like insignificant shifts in Kohut's definition of twinship over time reveals a distinct theoretical transformation from the psychology of the self to what we refer to as the psychology of being human.

Kohut's Twinship Across Cultures: The Psychology of Being Human chronicles a 10-year-voyage in which the authors struggled, initially independently, to make sense of Kohut‘s intentions when he radically re-defined the twinship experience to one of "being human among other human beings".

Commencing with an exploration of Kohut’s work on twinship and an illustration of the value of what he left for elaboration, Togashi and Kottler proceed to introduce a new and very different sensitivity to understanding particular psychoanalytic relational processes and ideas about human existential anguish, trauma, and the meaning of life. Together they tackle the twinship concept, which has often been misunderstood and about which little has been written. Uniquely, the book expands and elaborates upon Kohut’s final definition, "being human among other human beings." It problematizes this apparently simple concept with a wide range of clinical material, demonstrating the complexity of the statement and the intricacies involved in recognizing and working with traumatized patients who have never experienced this feeling. It asks how a sense of being human, as opposed to being described as human, can be generated and how this might help clinicians to better understand and work with trauma.

Written for psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists interested in self-psychological, intersubjective, and relational theories, Twinship Across Cultures will also be invaluable to clinicians working in the broader areas of psychoanalysis, psychotherapy, social work, psychiatry and education. It will enrich their sensitivity and capacity to understand and treat traumatized patients and the alienation they feel among other human beings.