For Immediate Release
Contact: Sylvia Williams, Director of Communications
805.898.2947
sawilliams@fielding.edu

Santa Barbara, CA (July 3, 2007)...The Alonso Center for Psychodynamic Studies at Fielding Graduate University Presents:

Dear Dr. Menninger
Karl Menninger, the Readers of the Ladies’ Home Journal, and the Invention of Psychoanalysis
Friday, July 20, 2007 - 7:00-9:00 pm
The Westin Crown Center · Liberty Conference Room
1 East Pershing Road, Kansas City, MO

Open to the public; no reservations required.

Speaker: Jessamyn Hatcher, PhD; General Studies Program, New York University; writer and lecturer on the popularization of psychoanalysis in the United States.

Discussant: Irwin Rosen, PhD; a one-time associate of Karl Menninger and the first post-doctoral fellow at the Menninger Clinic where he worked for 50 years; currently training supervisor at the St. Louis Psychoanalytic Institute.

In the 1930’s the editors of the Ladies’ Home Journal asked prominent Kansas City psychiatrist Dr. Karl Menninger, founder of the Menninger Clinic and influenced by Freud and psychoanalysis, to write a monthly column answering women’s letters about their problems. To everyone’s surprise, the women’s letters poured in by the thousands and were very heartfelt, asking about how to deal with depressed husbands who were unemployed, recalcitrant children, or their own anxieties and problems. Dr. Menninger responded in his columns and, amazingly, wrote to each woman individually. In the process he learned a lot that influenced how future generations of psychotherapists were taught and trained at the Menninger Clinic in Topeka.

In her presentation, Dr. Hatcher will talk about how the letters shaped Menninger’s thinking and his understanding of mental health, and how they led to a new conception of psychoanalysis.

Fielding Graduate University is headquartered in Santa Barbara, CA, where it was founded in 1974. It is a world-recognized leader in graduate education, having created one of the most successful distributed learning models for mid-career adults. Fielding is an accredited, non-profit graduate university offering numerous programs within three schools: Psychology, Human & Organization Development, and Educational Leadership & Change. The Fielding community is dedicated to lifelong learning; social justice and change; and innovation in organizations, communities, and society. For more information, visit www.fielding.edu.

Fielding’s Alonso Center is committed to supporting psychodynamic theory, therapy, and research to deepen people's awareness of themselves and the world.