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V. Ba. Emilio Rodrigué (Argentina) Inspired by classical work of Melanie Klein and Ernst Jones, Rodrigué (1966), in his paper The Nature and Function of Symbols , defines symbolization as: "… an active vital process, being the basic structure for the increasingly complex mental operations of the adult; in case of symbol pathology, all psychic activity suffers" (1966, p. 95). In the author’s opinion, we think and feel with symbols; furthermore, our ability to deal with symbols is a basic psychic function. Symbols can be used in different ways and, symbolization ranges from affectively charged signs that become replica of the original object, to the tremendous abstraction underlying mathematical language. Rodrigué asks himself: “how is the content expressed by the symbol?” (p. 95), and proposes a series of steps leading toward symbolization in order to answer the question. He illustrates this understanding with the clinical material of Raúl, a boy who was inhibited to play when he started treatment. In the fourth month of treatment, he began to play with water in the sink, flooding the room. As time went by, he then introduced a lampshade into the game, which he wets and then protects. For Rodrigué, at the beginning of the treatment, he had an internal unassimilated ideal object. In his words, there was no “affective traffic”. By diminishing the persecutory anxiety, he was able to externalize the idealized breast and his craving for it (i.e., the boy projected and embodied it into a "fit" external object). The sink was an iconic symbol of the breast. Later in the treatment, he repeated the game, but with different affective tones. Rodrigué emphasizes the care and concern for an object in contrast with the feelings of guilt and sadness resulting from the fear of having damaged it (depressive anxieties). Now, there is an intense bond with a specific object: "from this depressive experience a clear and net symbol emerges" (p. 100). A symbolic transformation occurs, resulting from the experience with the object: from the sink (equation symbol, replica of the object) to the lampshade (representative symbol). The process described, illustrated, and explained originated from the work with a very sick child, corresponding to the installation or recovery of the possibility of symbolizing in the therapeutic framework. Following Klein’s understanding, Rodrigué considers Klein’s theory of symbolization – as well as other aspects of development – as attempts to deal with anguish; therefore as a defensive process and not a process of normal development. He considers different forms of symbolism correspond with various psychic organizations; for example, the representative symbolism with the secondary process and the depressive position, and the symbolism of what came to be later called ‘symbolic equation’ with the primary process. The symbols belong to the type of relationship between self-other and they become more complex as this differentiation process progresses.
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