Abby and Patrick welcome psychoanalyst and author Jamieson Webster to discuss her brand-new book, On Breathing: Care in a Time of Catastrophe, out in March 2025 from Catapult. It’s a wide-ranging conversation that traverses clinical, social, and political domains while remaining firmly grounded in one of the most basic prerequisites for human life: the activity of breathing. In what ways does the history of psychoanalysis represent a repression of the fact of breathing? How do analytic accounts from Freud to Winnicott to Bion to Lacan variously take up or downplay the necessity of respiration? How does thinking about breath implicate our ideas about development, embodiment, the production of speech, and more? And how does thinking in a sustained way about breath challenge our assumptions about individuality, independence, and wellbeing? The three explore the stakes and meanings of breathing, from COVID wards to police violence to the wellness industry and beyond.

A pre-order link for On Breathing is available here: https://books.catapult.co/books/on-breathing/

Conversion Disorder: Listening to the Body in Psychoanalysis is here: https://cup.columbia.edu/book/conversion-disorder/9780231184083

Disorganization and Sex is here: https://divided.online/all-books/disorganisation-and-sex

March and April book tour dates for On Breathing:

3/11/25 7pm Eastern at Brooklyn Public Library - Central Library, Dweck Center (Brooklyn, NY) in conversation with Jia Tolentino

3/15/25 6pm Eastern at Riffraff (Providence, RI) in conversation with Kate Schapira

3/30/25 1pm Eastern virtual event with The Psychosocial Foundation

4/13/25 2pm Eastern at Pioneer Works (Brooklyn, NY) in conversation with Leslie Jamison and a performance by Andros Zins-Browne as part of the Second Sunday series

Have you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you’ve traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! (646) 450-0847

A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media:

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/ordinaryunhappiness

Twitter: @UnhappinessPod

Instagram: @ordinaryunhappiness

Patreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappiness

Conversion Disorder

Mentioned by

Mentioned in 1 episodes

The AI-powered Podcast Player