Alliance Events

Scholarly Dialogues: Nicholas DiCarlo,

The Asian American Experience Across the Classroom and the Clinic

What does it mean to be racialized as invisible, not only to others, but to oneself? 

And what happens when that invisibility enters the consulting room, whether in the experience of an Asian American clinician or patient? The therapeutic alliance may include psychic and relational dynamics that are easy to overlook: the burden of shame, the pressure to appear "high-functioning," and the quiet negotiation between being seen and remaining hidden. 

Can the psychoanalytic session be thought of as a shared dream? Starting from this evocative question, this event offers a reflection on clinical work through the lens of field theory, exploring the interplay between interpretation and conversation. All material brought into the session – nighttime dreams as well as everyday narratives – can be understood as an expression of an unconscious co-created by analyst and patient.

Scholarly Dialogues: Dianne Elise "Analytic Eroticism: Embodied Vitality in Clinical Process"

In our group discussion, we will consider a Winnicottian formulation of the analytic field in order to understand the often unspoken, implicit erotic dimensions of analytic work. Material from an analysis with a very inhibited, emotionally-constricted man shows both patient and analyst encountering difficulty in “locating” one another within the analytic field.

Scholarly Dialogues: Stephen Purcell "Un-Thinking Technique: The Analyst’s Presence in Treating Early Trauma"

Stephen Purcell will lead discussions of two of his papers that address the analyst’s way of being: “Psychic Song and Dance: Dissociation and Duets in the Analysis of Trauma (2019) and “Un-thinking Technique: On Being, Not Doing in the Psychoanalysis of the Sequelae of Trauma” (2026).

Scholarly Dialogues: Nicholas DiCarlo,

This course has filled.

Sex, Death and the Superego: Experiences in Psychoanalysis

In this recent book, Ron Britton, a British psychoanalyst in the object relations tradition, explores his experience working in psychoanalysis and what he has come to see as most important. We will read selected chapters from his book on these topics of sex, death and the superego. Britton especially explores the erotic transference-countertransference experience and the problem of the destructive superego. Please contact the instructor to enroll.

The Northwest Alliance for Psychoanalytic Society welcomes you back into our yearly event!

This year we are holding the Potential Space at the Good Shepherd Center in their famed Chapel Performing Arts and Gallery venue featuring beautiful lighting, wood floors, arched ceilings, and original stained-glass windows. Please come and join us! There will be plenty of room to move about, linger with the art, socialize, and enjoy the performances. Lite dessert and beverages will be served. Family and friends are welcome!

The Alliance offers mentoring groups as a membership benefit to psychotherapists who are in their first 10 years of clinical practice in the field of psychotherapy. The primary objective of the Alliance Mentor Program is to support early-career therapists through the challenges of beginning practice.

Registration opens on May 15, 2026, and closes on July 15, 2026.

Learn more about the Alliance Mentoring Groups for 2026-27.