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Somatic Apathy Body Disownership in the Context of Torture
Abstract
Muselmann was a term used in German concentration camps to describe prisoners near death due to exhaustion, starvation, and helplessness. This paper suggests that the inhuman conditions in the concentration camps resulted in the development of a defensive sense of disownership toward the entire body. The body, in such cases, is reduced to a pure object. However, in the case of the Muselmann this body-as-object is felt to belong to the captors, and as such is therefore identified as a tool to inflict suffering and pain on the Muselmann himself. In this situation, lacking cognitive resources, the Muselmann may have no other alternative than to treat his body as an enemy, and then to retreat or disinvest from the body. This response is a form of somatic apathy, an indifference that is tied to a loss of the self/non-self distinction. This may, in turn, lead to suicidal inclinations, even after liberation from the camp.
... It has been argued, however, that under conditions of severe and prolonged stress, such as the case of prisoners of war (POWs; Ataria & Neria, 2013), the cognitive system collapses and, in turn, trade-off model ceases to function. In this situation, so it has been suggested (Ataria & Gallagher, 2015) one may develop a sense of disownership toward the entire body. ...
... In the memory of Gabriel Balachsan 3) phenomenologically speaking, experiences constant torture, 4) has lost faith in humanity, resulting in a severe sense of helplessness, and 5) accepts and internalizes the belief that he or she must be annihilated (Ataria & Gallagher, 2015). ...
... With this in mind, a fundamental question arises concerning the long-term affects (symptomatology) of disownership toward the entire body during trauma (Figure 1). Although Ataria and Gallagher (2015) define the cognitive conditions for developing disownership toward the entire body during trauma, and Ataria (2015bAtaria ( , 2016 describes this phenomenon from a phenomenological perspective, this paper goes a step further, examining the long-term implications of disown-(i.e., spousal abuse), imprisonment as a political prisoner or a POW, or victimization. Furthermore, as will be discussed in the next sections, the more severe the posttraumatic symptoms are, the higher the probability that the long-term symptoms will be accompanied by SHB, D-PTSD, and C-PTSD. ...
This article suggests that, after severe and prolonged trauma (which, for the sake of simplicity, is referred to herein as trauma type II), cognitive resources are depleted and the victim is completely dependent on her persecutor. This, in turn, may cause the victim to develop a feeling of disownership toward the entire body. The central claim made herein is that when disownership toward the entire body becomes fixed/ permanent this can lead, in the long term, to complex posttraumatic stress disorder C-PTSD, a dissociative subtype of PTSD, and to self-harming behavior. The paper examines this issue from theoretical and phenomenological perspectives.
... To that end it adopts the phenomenological approach toward the traumatic experience, as part of a series of theoretical (Ataria 2014a(Ataria , 2015a and empirical (Ataria 2014b, c;Ataria and Neria 2013;Ataria and Somer 2013) studies which apply this approach in order to reexamine the very nature of the traumatic experience. This paper is thus part of a larger project describing various aspects of the traumatic experience from a phenomenological perspective (Ataria 2014a(Ataria , 2015aAtaria and Gallagher 2015). ...
... This section attempts to shed light on the conditions that may lead to the development of disownership toward the entire body. While Ataria and Gallagher (2015) discuss the cognitive conditions that allow for such a radical phenomenon to occur, this section offers a phenomenological discussion of its development. ...
... The victim cannot avoid any of these horrifying phenomena-she belongs to the captors in the most fundamental way possible since she is at once tortured and kept alive by the same figure(s). Given that one is thrown into the world with one's body, it is at the very least reasonable that in order for the victim to survive in a situation such as this, she must reject her own body (Ataria and Gallagher 2015). Yet as long as one identifies, even weakly, with one's body, one cannot avoid the world altogether. ...
This paper suggests that during severe and prolonged traumatic experiences such as trauma type II, one may develop disownership toward the entire body. In this situation one’s body becomes a pure object and as such an integral part of the hostile environment. This article applies Merleau-Ponty’s approach to perception in order to improve our understanding of this process.
... By describing the sense of boundaries in terms of need, S offers a deep insight: in a way, the SB is a protective shield. It is for this reason that during trauma one becomes dissociated, closing off one's boundaries as a defense mechanism (Ataria, 2014a(Ataria, , 2014b(Ataria, , 2015a(Ataria, , 2015b(Ataria, , 2015c(Ataria, , 2015dAtaria & Neria, 2013;Ataria & Somer, 2013;Ataria & Gallagher, 2015). By contrast, when feeling secure there is no need for rigid boundaries and, as a result, the SB becomes weaker (stage 2) and may even disappear (stage 3). ...
... Yet both hands are part of one whole which is able to touch itself and thus to function as subject and object at once (Merleau-Ponty, 1968). This example clarifies the mechanism that allows us to treat the individual as both subject and object; thus we can never lack either the subjective or the objective dimension (for exceptions see Ataria, 2015bAtaria, , 2015cAtaria, , 2015dAtaria & Gallagher, 2015). In this sense, the primary and basic structure of touching/being-touched is first and foremost a result of man's unique, twofold nature, twofold structure (Thompson, 2007). ...
... Yet, nevertheless, according to Sofsky (1996), the muselmann cannot be "reduced" to nosological diagnoses. The same also applies to the dokhodyagi. 2 It has been argued (Ataria & Gallagher 2015, Ataria 2016b2019c; 2020) that muselmänner and the dokhodyagi share at least one common feature: The complete collapse of the subjective experience. More specifically, in both cases, the individual loses the subjective point of view during the event (Agamben, 1999), becoming an empty set -{} or Ø, a lacuna (Ataria, in press). ...
This paper argues that severe and ongoing trauma (SOT) can lead to impairment at the level of the minimal self (MS), which is the core element in the structure of subjectivity. In the long-term, such impairments can result in complex post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) and schizophrenia. The paper tackles this issue while trying to create meaningful bridges between phenomenology and neuroscience. ARTICLE HISTORY
... In circumstances such as these, it seems that thoughts were conducted in a foreign language and the cognitive system appears was on the brink of collapse (Ataria, in press a;Ataria & Gallagher, 2015). The spoken language was severed from the language of thought. ...
This paper describes the phenomenology of the prisoner in the Gulag. In this extreme situation, the prisoner is reduced to the body-as-an-object and, as a result, develops a strong sense of hostility towards the body. In cognitive terms, this mechanism can be defined as body-disownership.
... When the tortured individual cannot separate the sense of self from the body, that individual undergoes a process of absolute reduction to the body-as-object, ultimately resulting in a negation of the self. This is the critical breaking point, at which the tortured individual begins to relate to his own body as the enemy (Ataria 2016a(Ataria , 2016bAtaria and Gallagher 2015;Ataria and Somer 2013). The tormentor is no longer responsible for the victim's pain; rather the victim's own body is responsible for this agony: ...
Based on his own experience, Jean Améry (At the Mind’s Limits, 1980) argued that torture is “the most horrible event a human being can retain within himself” (p. 22). This paper, relying largely on Améry’s own words, investigates this statement and seeks to provide it with a more concrete basis in phenomenology and embodied cognition. In particular, it demonstrates that torture destroys the most basic structure of the human being.
... At the same time, with a change in any one element, above a specific threshold, the self-pattern as a whole (as a complete form of existence) can change, in the same way that a dynamical gestalt changes when any part of it changes. For ex- 14 In some extreme cases, a self-pattern may be entirely disrupted -for example, in some cases of torture, or as a result of prolonged solitary confinement [43,93]. 15 The most obvious candidates for being essential to the self are the embodied and experiential aspects of the self-pattern, and these are interdependent. ...
Categorization-based diagnosis, which endeavors to be consistent with the third-person, objective measures of science, is not always adequate with respect to problems concerning diagnostic accuracy, demarcation problems when there are comorbidities, well-documented problems of symptom amplification, and complications of stigmatization and looping effects. While psychiatric categories have proved useful and convenient for clinicians in identifying a recognizable constellation of symptoms typical for a particular disorder for the purposes of communication and eligibility for treatment regimes, the reification of these categories has without doubt had negative consequences for the patient and also for the general understanding of psychiatric disorders. We argue that a complementary, integrated framework that focuses on descriptive symptom-based classifications (drawing on phenomenological interview methods and narrative) combined with a more comprehensive conception of the human subject (found in the pattern theory of self), can not only offer a solution to some of the vexed issues of psychiatric diagnosis but also support more
efficacious therapeutic interventions.
... The system created a situation in which the prisoner's body was the enemy. It is important to stress that there was no defined enemy: the system was almost passive, simply creating an unbearable situation in which the prisoner's body became the source of suffering (for a wider discussion, see (Ataria 2016a(Ataria , 2016b(Ataria 2018Ataria and Gallagher 2015;Ataria and Neria 2013)). ...
Based on the experience of innocent individuals who were arrested and sent to the Gulag, this paper examines the transformation from being human to being nonhuman. It suggests that during this process, one shifts from belonging to nonbelonging. As a result, similarly to Winston Smith–Orwell's hero in the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the prisoner is rebooted and reborn as an object belonging to the Gulag. In this situation, the prisoner internalizes the Gulag's rules in the deepest possible manner.
... In the traumatic condition we constantly examine life from afar and therefore never live life to the fullest. Absolute trauma contains only observation, without any point of reference, without an observer (Ataria, 2014;2015;in press;Ataria & Gallagher, 2015). There is no body to grab onto, and it is clear that the sense of self has collapsed. ...
Following the Vietnam War, the white male in America was defeated and humiliated, having undergone severe trauma of paternal loss and with this the loss of the entire patriarchal value system symbolized by the father. The soldier, defeated and lost, finds that he is no longer surrounded by his brothers in arms. Rather he is alone with his pain and isolation, filled with violence and unable to communicate with his families or with members of the opposite sex. He becomes shrouded in silence. After the trauma itself, he discovers that the real captivity is in fact at home, he cannot go on living as a normal “human being”. When the warrior chooses to remain in his old home (America) he becomes that same “taxi driver”, a fatherless, friendless, violent man, unable to form intimate relationships: not with men and certainly not with women. At the beginning of the twenty-first century the defeated white male began to sacrifice his body to the shopping channel and pornography. He surrenders happily to madness such as that of Tyler Durden in “Fight Club”. This article focuses on the male protagonists of the post-Vietnam films “Apocalypse Now”, “The Deer Hunter”, and “Taxi Driver” and of the later film “Fight Club”. These post-traumatic characters represent total splitting; two personalities existing within the same person and conducting themselves in totally separate dimensions: the conscious and the unconscious, father and son, the hunter and hunted, the captor and the captive, the male and the female, nature and metropolis, the self and “the other”, the familiar and the strange, the fake expression and the true mask. The central characteristic of this bipolar dialogue, this article suggests, is silence: words fall upon deaf ears and only blood can speak out loud.
... Two or more of the following: increased arousal, referring to anxiety or panic attacks, difficulty sleeping, a sense of a shortened future, hyper-vigilance for danger. Previous research has offered a phenomenological description of trauma focusing mainly on (i) the bodily level of experience during trauma (Ataria, 2014aAtaria, , 2014bAtaria, , 2015aAtaria, , 2015bAtaria, , 2015c Ataria & Gallagher, 2015; Ataria & Neria, 2013), (ii) the sense of self during trauma (Ataria, 2014a; Ataria & Neria, 2013) and (iii) the sense of time during trauma (Ataria & Neria, 2013). In this paper, however, I would like to go further and present a phenomenological description of PTSD, through the application of the concept of being-in-the-world. ...
This paper applies the concept of being-in-the-world, in particular the notion that we are in the world through our body, to the study of trauma. Since (i) trauma is experienced and remembered bodily, and since (ii) we are in the world through our bodies, for the post-traumatic survivor the body itself can become a source
of pain and unstructured-bodily somatic memory. Thus, in radical cases, the post-traumatic survivor may feel threatened by her own body. This can result in a complex and chronic dissociative subtype of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that, in turn, may be accompanied by a sense of disownership toward the body. This sense of disownership has yet to receive appropriate attention. This paper will argue that phenomenological work is needed in order to improve our understanding of this phenomenon and, by so doing, improve treatment for those suffering from complex PTSD.
... Rather it is necessary to consider the nature of the relationship between the SO and the SA.Another issue which must be examined in relation to this is the question of whether a more severe and prolonged peri-traumatic dissociative experience leads to unique and more severe symptoms in the long term, for example what is known as Disorders of Extreme Stress Not Otherwise Specified (DESNOS). Indeed, in my further research I on the basis of various testimonies from relevant literature, that radical and extended cases of peri-traumatic dissociation may lead to phenomena including (a) selfharming behavior, (b) a dissociative subtype of posttraumatic stress disorder, and (c) complex PTSD or DESNOS(Ataria, submitted b;Ataria & Gallagher, 2015).The SO and SA, both separately and as interdependent mechanisms, are further examined in the second, third (Ataria, Submitted a) and fourth(Ataria, 2014c) papers. The second paper argues that the more severe the traumatic experience, the greater the decrease in SO figure 1). ...
The natural sciences seek to explain all natural phenomena, including human beings. This lofty objective encompasses the scientific project in all its glory, within which brain science constitutes an integral part. Essentially, however, neuroscientists not only seek to achieve a greater understanding of how the human brain works but rather, and perhaps mainly, aspire to understand human consciousness, that is, the subjective experience. According to this approach, consciousness is merely brain activity, and thus any progress in the study of the brain represents an advance in the study of consciousness. Yet, despite the many and impressive neuroscientific achievements, when it comes to understanding human consciousness, this discipline cannot deliver the goods. This ongoing failure, so it will be suggested, arouses uncanny anxiety, largely because consciousness is the only phenomenon in which we have complete confidence. The present article suggests that in order to advance our understanding of the subjective experience, we must focus on how the body is thrown into the world in the here-and-now.
Phenomenology has always extended into a vast array of questions that are the primary concern of other disciplines, including fields such as psychiatry and medicine, education, literature, architecture and design, theology, and ethics. This chapter focuses on a relatively newly defined area of application: critical hermeneutics, which concerns social and political issues. After reviewing some early social and political thought in phenomenology, the chapter explores the concept of critical phenomenology, some classic works by Franz Fanon and Iris Marion Young, and the recent analysis of solitary confinement by Lisa Guenther. We conclude by discussing the role of phenomenology in critical phenomenology.
This chapter presents two studies that were carried out in accordance with the phenomenological approach (see Appendix): the first involved interviews with 15 former prisoners of war (POWs) who were imprisoned in Egypt and Syria after the Yom Kippur War (1973), while in the second I interviewed 27 senior meditators with an average of 10,000 hours of accumulated practice each. The aim of both these studies was to expose the pre-reflective experience during altered states of consciousness (ASCs).
Salamandra (1946; Eng. Sunrise over Hell, 1977) was one of the first books about the Holocaust to appear in Hebrew and is certainly one of the best known. It is an extreme work by any standard, and many subsequent books on the subject of the Holocaust may very well have been understated precisely in reaction to this work. The Salamandra series—comprising Salamandra (1946; Eng. Sunrise over Hell, 1977), Beit habubot (1953; Eng. House of Dolls, 1955), Hasha’on (1960; Eng. Star Eternal, 1966), Piepel (1961; Eng. Piepel, 1961 [Atrocity/Moni, 1963]), and Ha’imut (first published as Kaḥol me’efer, 1966; Eng. Phoenix over the Galilee, 1969 [House of Love, 1971])—thus remains an anomaly in the landscape of Holocaust literature. Had Ka-Tzetnik concluded his chronicle with these five books, much of the criticism against him in recent decades might have had merit. The sixth book in the Salamandra series, however, Hatsofen (1987; Eng. Shivitti, 1989), which is, in a certain sense, a reflective work on the series and on the author himself, made Ka-Tzetnik the writer a far more complex and interesting figure, no longer merely eccentric and excessive, as many would have it.
Both Levi and Ka-Tzetnik agree that the Muselmann is not merely an accident or a by-product of the totalitarian state and progress, but proof of the successful implementation of the principle of ‘progress through technology’, taken to a twisted extreme in the context of totalitarianism. That said, it is clear why they believe that the Muselmann is key to understanding the concentration and extermination camps. This chapter will address the respective ways in which Levi and Ka-Tzetnik try to describe the Muselmann’s inner world.
Body image (BI) and body schema (BS) refer to two different yet closely related systems. Whereas BI can be defined as a system of perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs pertaining to one's own body, BS is a system of sensory-motor capacities that functions without awareness or the necessity of perceptual monitoring. Studies have demonstrated that applying the concepts of BI and BS enables us to conceptualize complex pathological phenomena such as anorexia, schizophrenia, and depersonalization. Likewise, it has further been argued that these concepts play a crucial role in our ability to grasp our bodily experiences in the socio-cultural world according to various factors, such as gender, social class, and ethnicity. Referring to the insights of Frantz Fanon, the author of Black Skin, White Masks, this paper suggests that under certain conditions the BI can take over and reshape the BS (or the BI is assimilated into the BS). Based on an examination of Fanon’s writings, the paper suggests that not only the BI can truly remold the BS but that the gaze of the other can directly influence the BI.
The presented analytical preview considers the main approaches to the relationship between dissociation, trauma and self-harm. This relationship is functionally complex and depends on many variables. In regards to trauma dissociation and self-harm are (1) defense mechanisms, activating to traumatic cues; (2) destructive pathological self-regulatory modes. Meantime functional links between dissociation and self-harm reveal two tendencies: anti-dissociation (regaining control) and dissociation-inducing (rejecting one’s feelings). Dissociation is widely considered a mediator between trauma and self-harm. At the same time psychological mechanisms, such as emotion regulation and body rejection, exert significant influence on pathological post-traumatic development. We discuss the psychopathological aspects of the links between trauma, dissociation and self-harm in borderline personality and eating disorders. We also take note of the gender- and age-related peculiarities of these issues.
במאמר זה נבחן את תפקיד העֵד כמספר, כסופר וכהיסטוריון תוך השוואה בין פרימו
לוי לבין ז'ורז' פֶּרֶק. לטענתי, משום שהעֵד הוא גם ההיסטוריון של עצמו, אין הוא עֵד
תמים. עם זאת הן לוי והן פֶּרֶק, כל איש בדרכו, מציעים מודל אותנטי של עדות. לוי
מסר עדות מתוך תחושת אלביתי וכתיבתו חרדה מהאין ומהשתיקה, ואילו פֶּרֶק התמודד
עם החרדה הזו וכתב את )ולא רק על( השתיקה ומתוכה. מהלך זה של פֶּרֶק מאפשר לנו
לדמיין מודל פסיכואנליטי חדש לפריצת חומות המילים.
Throughout the book, I emphasize the connection between the concepts of the postraumatic individual on the one hand and the posttraumatic culture on the other hand, even though the shift from individual to society is not at all clear in this context. In this chapter, then, I examine how trauma can shift from the individual to society. I bring up what I believe to be a necessary reservation when describing trauma in terms of society.
Can we rewrite the birth, development, and death of the monotheistic religions as a traumatic history? The present chapter aims to serve as a starting point for such an attempt. For this purpose, I shall, first of all, critically reevaluate some theses of Sigmund Freud’s Moses and Monotheism and then offer a new approach to the relation between trauma and religion. Subsequently, a brief sketch will be attempted for the composition of a traumatic history of monotheism as the cyclic process of the execution machine. In the concluding section I shall shed some light on the problem of trauma in modernity by giving a new interpretation to Walter Benjamin’s vision of the messianic machine.
This article suggests that, after severe and prolonged trauma (which, for the sake of simplicity, is referred to herein as trauma type II), cognitive resources are depleted and the victim is completely dependent on her persecutor. This, in turn, may cause the victim to develop a feeling of disownership toward the entire body. The central claim made herein is that when disownership toward the entire body becomes fixed/ permanent this can lead, in the long term, to complex posttraumatic stress disorder C-PTSD, a dissociative subtype of PTSD, and to self-harming behavior. The paper examines this issue from theoretical and phenomenological perspectives.
Several recently developed philosophical approaches to the self promise to enhance
the exchange of ideas between the philosophy of the mind and the other cognitive
sciences. This review examines two important concepts of self: the ‘minimal self’, a self
devoid of temporal extension, and the ‘narrative self’, which involves personal identity
and continuity across time. The notion of a minimal self is first clarified by drawing a
distinction between the sense of self-agency and the sense of self-ownership for actions.
This distinction is then explored within the neurological domain with specific reference
to schizophrenia, in which the sense of self-agency may be disrupted. The convergence
between the philosophical debate and empirical study is extended in a discussion of
more primitive aspects of self and how these relate to neonatal experience and robotics.
The second concept of self, the narrative self, is discussed in the light of Gazzaniga’s
left-hemisphere ‘interpreter’ and episodic memory. Extensions of the idea of a narrative
self that are consistent with neurological models are then considered. The review
illustrates how the philosophical approach can inform cognitive science and suggests
that a two-way collaboration may lead to a more fully developed account of the self.
At present, due in part to our insufficient understanding of the traumatic experience, we are unable to account for the fact that while some people develop post-traumatic symptoms following a traumatic event, others do not. This article suggests that by adopting the enactive approach to perception—according to which perceiving is a way of acting—we may be able to improve our understanding of the traumatic experience and the factors which result in the development of post-traumatic symptoms. The central argument presented in this paper is that when the options of flight or fight are unavailable as a coping/defense mechanism, one freezes (freeze response). In this situation, the ability to master one’s movements is damaged and, in radical cases, the ability to move is lost altogether; as a result the sensorimotor loop may collapse. This, in turn, leads to distorted perception and, in consequence, memory disorders may develop.
Dissociation during trauma (peritraumatic dissociation) lacks an adequate definition. Using data obtained from interviews with 36 posttraumatic individuals conducted according to the phenomenological approach, this paper seeks to improve our understanding of this phenomenon. In particular, it suggesting a trade off model depicting the balance between the sense of agency (the sense of control over the body) and the sense of ownership (the sense that this is my body): a reciprocal relationship appears to exist between these two, and in order to enable control of the body during trauma the sense of ownership must decrease. When the relationship between the sense of agency and sense of ownership changes disproportionately to the constraints of the traumatic event, the dissociative mechanism becomes dysfunctional. By contrast, when the relations alter in accordance with the surrounding conditions, the dissociative mechanism functions properly.
This paper seeks to describe and analyze the traumatic experience through an examination of the sense of agency—the sense of controlling one’s body, and sense of ownership—the sense that it is my body that undergoes experiences. It appears that there exist (at least) two levels of traumatic experience: on the first level one loses the sense of agency but retains the sense of ownership, whilst on the second one loses both of these, with symptoms becoming progressively more severe. A comparison of the traumatic experience with various modulations of the senses of agency and ownership, from cases involving prostheses to tools requiring greater or lesser extents of control, suggests that the harsher the traumatic event, the greater the damage is to the sense of ownership, resulting in the increasing sense of the body as a tool rather than an original organism. Likewise, the long-term ramifications become more severe according to the significance of the damage to the sense of ownership.
What happens when subjects are deprived of intersubjective contact? This paper looks closely at the phenomenology and psychology of one example of that deprivation: solitary confinement. It also puts the phenomenology and psychology of solitary confinement to use in the legal context. Not only is there no consensus on whether solitary confinement is a "cruel and unusual punishment," there is no consensus on the definition of the term "cruel" in the use of that legal phrase. I argue that we can find a moral consensus on the meaning of "cruelty" by looking specifically at the phenomenology and psychology of solitary confinement.
Abstract Fundamental aspects of trauma - among them dissociation during trauma, which is considered one of the strongest predictors for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) - are not fully understood. This paper argues (1) that the application of the phenomenological structure of time and the phenomenological description of the self (minimal self, sense of ownership, sense of agency, sense of self) to dissociation during trauma can improve our understanding of this phenomenon- at its occurrence and during any possible ensuing symptoms. In addition (2) it will be argued that phenomenological approach, as a method that focuses on the bodily level of experience, in particular the body as it is experienced from within, enables us to penetrate the traumatic experience. Thus by applying the phenomenological approach we may be able to improve our understanding of the traumatic experience and enable the development of better treatment.
I argue for a pattern theory of self as a useful way to organize an interdisciplinary approach to discussions of what constitutes a self. According to the pattern theory, a self is constituted by a number of characteristic features or aspects that may include minimal embodied, mini-mal experiential, affective, intersubjective, psychological/cognitive, narrative, extended, and situated aspects. A pattern theory of self helps to clarify various interpretations of self as compatible or commensurable instead of thinking them in opposition, and it helps to show how various aspects of self may be related across certain dimensions. I also suggest that a pattern theory of self can help to adjudicate (or at least map the differences) between the idea that the self correlates to self-referential processing in the cortical midline structures of the brain and other narrower or wider conceptions of self.
Part of the project of reweaving the threads of the history of the Third Reich, the essay discusses the complex relation between the testimony of the victims and their body as an epistemic source of the witnessing. On a theoretical bases constructed with the help of Shoah memoirs – by Primo Levi, Jean Améry, Jorge Sempun, Robert Antelme, and others, the paper challenges the notion of the witness as a speaker, a narrator; instead, it treats the kind of victim that since Auschwitz has been known as “a Muselmann†as an integral witness. It is the body of the survivor that constitutes integral testimony; it fills a testimonial lacuna. The presence of the Muselmann is testifiable, and it can replace the memoir by the body as the repository of the event. When the body translates into the corpus of writing, survivor testimony is perceived as incomplete so long as the Muselmann is perceived as the other. The lacuna in survivor narratives is testimony from inside the experience of the Muselmann.
War captivity is an extreme traumatic experience typically involving exposure to repeated stressors, including torture, isolation, and humiliation. Cap-tives are flung from their previous known world into an unfamiliar reality in which their state of consciousness may undergo significant change. In the present study extensive interviews were conducted with fifteen Israeli former prisoners of war who fell captive during the 1973 Yom Kippur war with the goal of examining the architecture of human thought in subjects lacking a sense of body (disembodiment) as a result of confinement and isolation. Analysis of the interviews revealed that threats to a normal sense of body often lead to a loss of the sense of time as an objective dimension. Evidence suggests that the loss of the sense of body and the loss of the sense of time are in fact connected; that is, they collapse together. This breakdown in turn results in a collapse of the sense of self.
The massive traumatization of World War I combat soldiers led to an unprecedented incidence of somatoform dissociative disorders and symptoms, usually diagnosed as hysterical disorders during the war years. Following a brief overview of the scope of the suffering during this Great War, attention is given to British army psychiatrist Charles S. Myers' (1940) observations of the alternation between a so-called “emotional” personality and an “apparently normal” personality in traumatized combat soldiers. Somatoform dissociation, further categorized into positive and negative symptoms, is related to this structural dissociation, and to fixation in the trauma and avoidance of the trauma, and may be part of a more encompassing symptomatology. Next, a short overview of diagnostic issues is given. We argue that the DSM-IV category of “conversion disorder” is incorrect. Rather, the findings revealed here support Janet's classic and Nijenhuis' more recent views on somatoform dissociation. Finally, treatment issues are briefly presented.
The massive traumatization of World War I combat sol- diers led to an unprecedented incidence of somatoform dissociative disorders and symptoms, usually diagnosed as hysterical disorders dur- ing the war years. Following a brief overview of the scope of the suffering during this Great War, attention is given to British army psychiatrist Charles S. Myers' (1940) observations of the alternation between a so-called ''emotional'' personality and an ''apparently nor- mal'' personality in traumatized combat soldiers. Somatoform dissoci- ation, further categorized into positive and negative symptoms, is re- lated to this structural dissociation, and to fixation in the trauma and avoidance of the trauma, and may be part of a more encompassing symptomatology. Next, a short overview of diagnostic issues is given. We argue that the DSM-IV category of ''conversion disorder'' is incor- rect. Rather, the findings revealed here support Janet's classic and Ni- jenhuis' more recent views on somatoform dissociation. Finally, treat- ment issues are briefly presented. (Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-342-9678. E-mail address: Website:
Patients with complex dissociative disorders remain in alternating psychophysiological states which are discrete, discontinuous, and resistant against integrative tendencies. In this contribution, a parallel is drawn between animal defensive and recuperative states that are evoked in the face of severe threat and the characteristic responses of dissociative disorder patients as displayed in major dissociative states. Empirical data and clinical observations seem to be supportive of the idea that there are similarities between freezing, concomitant development of analgesia and anesthesia, and acute pain in threatened animals and severely traumatized human beings.
Several recently developed philosophical approaches to the self promise to enhance the exchange of ideas between the philosophy of the mind and the other cognitive sciences. This review examines two important concepts of self: the 'minimal self', a self devoid of temporal extension, and the 'narrative self', which involves personal identity and continuity across time. The notion of a minimal self is first clarified by drawing a distinction between the sense of self-agency and the sense of self-ownership for actions. This distinction is then explored within the neurological domain with specific reference to schizophrenia, in which the sense of self-agency may be disrupted. The convergence between the philosophical debate and empirical study is extended in a discussion of more primitive aspects of self and how these relate to neonatal experience and robotics. The second concept of self, the narrative self, is discussed in the light of Gazzaniga's left-hemisphere 'interpreter' and episodic memory. Extensions of the idea of a narrative self that are consistent with neurological models are then considered. The review illustrates how the philosophical approach can inform cognitive science and suggests that a two-way collaboration may lead to a more fully developed account of the self.
Imprecise conceptualizations of dissociation hinder understanding of trauma-related dissociation. An heuristic resolution for research and clinical practice is proposed.
Current conceptualizations of dissociation are critically examined. They are compared with a new theory that incorporates classical views on dissociation with other contemporary theories related to traumatization, viewing dissociation as a lack of integration among psychobiological systems that constitute personality, that is, as a structural dissociation of the personality.
Most current views of dissociation are overinclusive and underinclusive. They embrace non-dissociative phenomena--rigid alterations in the level and field of consciousness--prevalent in non-traumatized populations, and which do not require structural dissociation. These views also largely disregard somatoform and positive symptoms of dissociation and underestimate integrative deficiencies, while emphasizing the psychological defensive function of dissociation. They do not offer a common psychobiological pathway for the spectrum of trauma-related disorders. Structural dissociation of the personality likely involves divisions among at least two psychobiological systems, each including a more or less distinct apperceptive centre, that is, a dissociative part of the personality. Three prototypical levels of structural dissociation are postulated to correlate with particular trauma-related disorders.
Limitation of the concept of dissociation to structural dividedness of the personality sets it apart from related but non-dissociative phenomena and provides a taxonomy of dissociative symptoms. It postulates a common psychobiological pathway for all trauma-related disorders. Trauma-related dissociation is maintained by integrative deficits and phobic avoidance. This conceptualization advances diagnosis, classification, treatment and research of trauma-related disorders.
Watching a rubber hand being stroked, while one's own unseen hand is synchronously stroked, may cause the rubber hand to be attributed to one's own body, to "feel like it's my hand." A behavioral measure of the rubber hand illusion (RHI) is a drift of the perceived position of one's own hand toward the rubber hand. The authors investigated (a) the influence of general body scheme representations on the RHI in Experiments 1 and 2 and (b) the necessary conditions of visuotactile stimulation underlying the RHI in Experiments 3 and 4. Overall, the results suggest that at the level of the process underlying the build up of the RHI, bottom-up processes of visuotactile correlation drive the illusion as a necessary, but not sufficient, condition. Conversely, at the level of the phenomenological content, the illusion is modulated by top-down influences originating from the representation of one's own body.
The objective of this paper is to describe and conceptualize an unusual and probably rare condition: the intense longstanding desire to have an amputation.
Structured interviews were conducted by telephone of 52 subjects (mean age: 48.6, range 23-77 years; 47 male, 4 female, 1 intersexed) self-identified as having had a desire to have an amputation.
Seventeen per cent (n = 9) had an arm or leg amputated with two-thirds using methods that put the subject at risk of death and one-third enlisting a surgeon to amputate their healthy limb. The most common reported reason for wanting an amputation was the subject's feeling that it would correct a mismatch between the person's anatomy and sense of his or her 'true' self (identity). None were delusional. For all but one subject age at onset was during childhood or early adolescence. For those who had psychotherapy or medication there was no change in the intensity of the desire for amputation. The six subjects who had an amputation at their desired site reported that following the amputation they felt better than they ever had and no longer had a desire for an amputation.
These preliminary results suggest the existence of an extremely unusual clinically distinct condition characterized by a lifelong desire to have an amputation of a particular limb. The condition is associated with serious negative consequences: amputation attempts, impairment and marked distress. Reflecting similarities between Gender Identity Disorder and this condition, the author suggests that it may be conceptualized as an unusual dysfunction in the development one's fundamental sense of anatomical (body) identity.
The massive traumatization of World War I combat soldiers led to an unprecedented incidence of somatoform dissociative disorders and symptoms, usually diagnosed as hysterical disorders during the war years. Following a bricf overview of the scope of the suffering during this Great War, attention is given to British army psychiatrist Charles S. Myers' (1940) observations of the alternation between a so-called "emotional" personality and an "apparently normal" personality in traumatized combat soldiers. Somatoform dissociation, further categorized into positive and negative symptoms, is related to this structural dissociation, and to fixation in the trauma and avoidance of the trauma, and may be part of a more encompassing symptomatology. Next, a short overview of diagnostic issues is given. We argue that the DSM-IV category of "conversion disorder" is incorrect. Rather, the findings revealed here support Janet's classic and Nijenhuis' more recent views on somatoform dissociation. Finally, treat-ment issues are bricfly presented. ;
Pathological reactions to trauma and extreme stress have been noted in the psychological literature for over a century. These reactions were codified in the psychiatric literature as posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (American Psychiatric Association, 1980). The diagnosis of PTSD is made when posttrauma symptoms occur in three domains: emotional, cognitive, and visual reexperiencing of the trauma; avoidance of trauma-relevant stimuli; and general arousal. Since the inception of PTSD as a diagnostic entity, experts have focused on the fear and anxiety components of the disorder (Foa, Steketee, & Rothbaum, 1989; Keane, Zimering, & Caddell, 1985). More recently, trauma researchers have become interested in the phenomenon of affective and cognitive avoidance that is commonly observed following a trauma and has been referred to as dissociation (e.g., Spiegel, Hunt, & Dondershine, 1988), denial (Horowitz, 1986; van der Kolk, 1987), or numbing (e.g., Foa, Riggs, & Gershuny, 1995; Horowitz, Wilner, Kaltreider, & Alvarez, 1980; Litz, 1993; van der Kolk & Ducey, 1989). Common to these constructs is a diminished awareness of one’s emotions or thoughts, which is hypothesized to be motivated by self-preservation.
What grounds my experience of my body as my own? The body that one experiences is always one’s own, but it does not follow that one always experiences it as one’s own. One might even feel that a body part does not belong to oneself despite feeling sensations in it, like in asomatognosia. The article aims at understanding the link between bodily sensations and the sense of ownership by investigating the role played by the body schema.
There are two main pathways to investigate the sense of body ownership, (i) through the study of the conditions of embodiment for an object to be experienced as one's own and (ii) through the analysis of the deficits in patients who experience a body part as alien. Here, I propose that E is embodied if some properties of E are processed in the same way as the properties of one's body. However, one must distinguish among different types of embodiment, and only self-specific embodiment can lead to feelings of ownership. I address issues such as the functional role and the dynamics of embodiment, degrees and measures of ownership, and shared body representations between self and others. I then analyse the interaction between ownership and disownership. On the one hand, I show that there is no evidence that in the Rubber Hand Illusion, the rubber hand replaces the biological hand. On the other hand, I argue that the sense of disownership experienced by patients towards their body part cannot be reduced to the mere lack of ownership.
What grounds the experience of our body as our own? Can we rationally doubt that this is our own body when we feel sensations in it? Here, I show how recent empirical evidence can shed light on issues on the body and the self, such as the grounds of the sense of body ownership and the immunity to error through misidentification of bodily self-ascriptions. In particular, I discuss how bodily illusions (e.g., the Rubber Hand Illusion), bodily disruptions (e.g., somatoparaphrenia) and the multimodal nature of bodily self-knowledge challenge a classic view of ownership and immunity that puts bodily sensations at its core.
The work of Giorgio Agamben, one of Italyâs most important and original philosophers, has been based on an uncommon erudition in classical traditions of philosophy and rhetoric, the grammarians of late antiquity, Christian theology, and modern philosophy. Recently, Agamben has begun to direct his thinking to the constitution of the social and to some concrete, ethico-political conclusions concerning the state of society today, and the place of the individual within it. In Homo Sacer, Agamben aims to connect the problem of pure possibility, potentiality, and power with the problem of political and social ethics in a context where the latter has lost its previous religious, metaphysical, and cultural grounding. Taking his cue from Foucaultâs fragmentary analysis of biopolitics, Agamben probes with great breadth, intensity, and acuteness the covert or implicit presence of an idea of biopolitics in the history of traditional political theory. He argues that from the earliest treatises of political theory, notably in Aristotleâs notion of man as a political animal, and throughout the history of Western thinking about sovereignty (whether of the king or the state), a notion of sovereignty as power over âlifeâ is implicit. The reason it remains merely implicit has to do, according to Agamben, with the way the sacred, or the idea of sacrality, becomes indissociable from the idea of sovereignty. Drawing upon Carl Schmittâs idea of the sovereignâs status as the exception to the rules he safeguards, and on anthropological research that reveals the close interlinking of the sacred and the taboo, Agamben defines the sacred person as one who can be killed and yet not sacrificedâa paradox he sees as operative in the status of the modern individual living in a system that exerts control over the collective ânaked lifeâ of all individuals.
A review of published brain-damaged patients showing delusional beliefs concerning the contralesional side of the body (somatoparaphrenia) is presented. Somatoparaphrenia has been reported, with a few exceptions, in right-brain-damaged patients, with motor and somatosensory deficits, and the syndrome of unilateral spatial neglect. Somatoparaphrenia, most often characterized by a delusion of disownership of left-sided body parts, may however occur without associated anosognosia for motor deficits, and personal neglect. Also somatosensory deficits may not be a core pathological mechanism of somatoparaphrenia, and visual field disorders may be absent. Deficits of proprioception, however, may play a relevant role. Somatoparaphrenia is often brought about by extensive right-sided lesions, but patients with posterior (parietal-temporal), and insular damage are on record, as well as a few patients with subcortical lesions. Possible pathological factors include a deranged representation of the body concerned with ownership, mainly right-hemisphere-based, and deficits of multisensory integration. Finally, the rubber hand illusion, that brings about a bodily misattribution in neurologically unimpaired participants, as somatoparaphrenia does in brain-damaged patients, is briefly discussed.
Peritraumatic dissociation has been associated with subsequent development of posttraumatic stress disorder, but supporting data have been largely retrospective. The current study was designed to assess the nature and prevalence of dissociative symptoms in healthy humans experiencing acute, uncontrollable stress during U.S. Army survival training.
In study 1, 94 subjects completed the Clinician-Administered Dissociative States Scale after exposure to the stress of survival training. In study 2, 59 subjects completed the Brief Trauma Questionnaire before acute stress and the dissociative states scale before and after acute stress. A randomly selected group of subjects in study 2 completed a health problems questionnaire after acute stress.
In study 1, 96% of subjects reported dissociative symptoms in response to acute stress. Total scores, as well as individual item scores, on the dissociation scale were significantly lower in Special Forces soldiers compared to general infantry troops. In study 2, 42% of subjects reported dissociative symptoms before stress and 96% reported them after acute stress. Dissociative symptoms before and after stress were significantly higher in individuals who reported a perceived threat to life in the past. Forty-one percent of the variance in reported health problems was accounted for by poststress dissociation scores.
Symptoms of dissociation were prevalent in healthy subjects exposed to high stress. Stress-hardy individuals (Special Forces soldiers) experienced fewer symptoms of dissociation, compared to individuals who were less hardy. These data support the idea that the nature of response to previously experienced threatening events significantly determines the nature of psychological and somatic response to subsequent stress.
Depersonalization has long been considered a syndrome but there is poor agreement on its constituent symptoms.
In order to establish whether different symptoms of depersonalization represent the expression of a single or several underlying dimensions, an exploratory factor analysis on the Cambridge Depersonalization Scale (CDS) was carried out on 138 consecutive patients diagnosed with depersonalization disorder.
Four well determined factors accounting for 73.3% of the variance were extracted. These were labelled 'Anomalous Body Experience'; 'Emotional Numbing'; 'Anomalous Subjective Recall' and 'Alienation from Surroundings'.
Symptoms of depersonalization belong to distinct but related psychopathological domains.
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