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that persists parallel to two other types of physical production; the one proper to the primary process and the one proper to the secondary process” (Aulagnier, 1975, p. XXIX) It may be also relevant that one of the earliest contibutions noting ‘pictogram’ and ‘idiogram’ in a psychoanalytic press on the record was made by a philologist psychoanalyst Joe Sunguam (1924), who studied stages of evolution of an ancient Summerian script. He wrote: “It contains to begin with the pictogram, followed by the ideogram and the phonogram” (p. 263). Elaborating on “a psychic structure of a language” (p. 276), he found that “When one compares the psychic structure of the Sumerian written language with that of the Chinese one is at once impressed with the fact that the thought processes of the Chinese Literati were of a much more exact and precise type. There is a degree of clearness and a lack of ambiguity in a page of Chinese script which strikes one with startling vividness” (ibid, 276). V. Be. Myrta Casas de Pereda (Uruguay) A Lacanian analyst, Casas de Pereda, in her article: “Research in Psychoanalysis” (1996) defines symbolization as: a "process and production that has the subject in its division as a goal” (p.1). She conceptualizes symbolization as a process, which occurs in different degrees and on two levels. On the first level it coexists with repression, which in its turn requires triangulation and includes the superego prohibition of incest. The second level refers to the narcissistic (imaginary) dimension "a work of symbolization around the presence-absence (in a binary relation) where contiguities or metonymic similarities could be combined" (p.2). Symbolization may use primary as well as secondary repression; and may also employ narcissistic defenses such as disavowal, representation by opposite, and the turning against the self. Casas de Pereda illustrates her symbolization theory with two vignettes from her clinical practice, as a child analyst: A 5-year-old patient, in the midst of disorganizing anxiety, explains to his analyst that he could not draw the rain because the paper could get wet. For her, this psychotic child, functioning on a concrete level, had not achieved any level of symbolization. Another example is a 2 year and 8 months old girl who was playing with an imaginary friend. This game, which arises shortly after abrupt life changes –moving houses and a mother’s miscarriage– became essential. For her analyst, this imaginary friend is this girl’s creation to substitute the absent mother and to deal with the unknown. The game illustrates a process of symbolization around the presence-absence. In her article “The helplessness of loss of love: regarding absence of love in childhood” (2018), she describes depression in childhood based on psychic helplessness, when it is difficult to count on the capacity to symbolize/think/verbalize (p. 23). Additionally, she highlights the importance of “the symbolic function exercised by the mother” (p. 12).
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