Postcolonial Critical Psychology and Psychoanalysis
Summary
Postcolonial critical psychology and psychoanalysis constitutes an integrative field that interrogates how colonial histories and power relations shape individual and collective subjectivities. It critiques Eurocentric assumptions underpinning mainstream psychological theories and therapeutic practices, revealing their complicity in reproducing colonial hierarchies. Drawing on key postcolonial thinkers—most notably Frantz Fanon—this work explores how colonial violence inflicts psychic wounds that persist across generations, while psychoanalytic frameworks offer tools to understand unconscious processes of internalised oppression. Interdisciplinary methods deploy decolonial methodologies to foreground voices from formerly colonised contexts, challenge universalist claims and reframe concepts of normality, identity and trauma. This research carries global significance in reshaping mental-health interventions, informing culturally grounded therapies and supporting socio-political empowerment. By forging links between critical psychology and psychoanalysis, the field expands our conceptualisation of psychic life under coloniality and advances more equitable, contextually attuned practices.
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Postcolonial Critical Psychology and Psychoanalysis publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in postcolonial critical psychology and psychoanalysis across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Postcolonial critical psychology: Examination of psychological theories and practices from the standpoint of colonial histories and power relations.
Psychoanalysis: A theoretical and therapeutic approach focusing on unconscious processes and their influence on behaviour and subjectivity.
Black redaction: A critical strategy that reconfigures psychoanalytic case material to resist colonial pathologisation and imagine alternative psychic truths.
Colonial trauma: The enduring psychological and intergenerational effects resulting from colonial violence and oppression.
Whiteness: A socio-historical construct denoting white racial identity and its hegemonic cultural, political and psychic dimensions.
References
- Refusing pathology: Black redaction in Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth. Philosophy & Social Criticism (2024).
- Whiteness and/as war. Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society (2022).
- Missing in Action: Where’s the Unconscious in Anti-Racist “Unconscious Bias Training”?. Humanities (2024).
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