Clara Mabel Thompson was a prominent psychiatrist and psychoanalyst and co-founder of the William Alanson White Institute.
18 Facts About Clara Thompson
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Clara Thompson published articles and books about psychoanalysis as a whole and specifically about the psychology of women.
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Clara Thompson interned at the New York Infirmary for Women and Children, and she completed her residency in psychiatry at The Henry Phipps Psychiatric Clinic at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1925.
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Clara Thompson established a private practice and taught at Vassar College and the New York Psychoanalytic Institute.
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Clara Thompson studied with Sandor Ferenczi, a pupil and colleague of Freud, in Budapest.
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Clara Thompson co-founded the American Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis and was elected its first vice president.
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Clara Thompson published over 50 papers, articles, and reviews over the course of her career, as well as three books, including Psychoanalysis: Evolution and Development.
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In 1943, Clara Thompson founded the William Alanson White Psychiatric Foundation in New York together with Erich Fromm, Harry Stack Sullivan, Frieda Fromm-Reichmann, David Rioch and Janet Rioch.
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Clara Thompson served as its executive director for many years and worked there until her death in 1958.
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Clara Thompson had an extensive knowledge of the field of psychoanalysis regarding both developments and the different positions and schools.
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In describing the different schools Clara Thompson took a position in the middle of the psychoanalytic spectrum; she always stressed what different views could add to the field and always spoke with great respect about representatives of the different schools.
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Clara Thompson passionately believed in the value of psychoanalysis for enhancing the humanity of persons, no matter how sick they appeared to be.
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Clara Thompson's book Psychoanalysis: Evolution and Development is a comprehensive documentation of the course of psychoanalytic theory and practice.
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Clara Thompson refers to cultural anthropology research as another contributor to further evolution of psychoanalysis.
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Clara Thompson considered the status of women in relation to men in regard to its fluctuate development in the course of the centuries and in different cultures and societies.
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Clara Thompson saw gender most fundamentally as a cultural creation: gender characteristics are established by the assignment of social cultural meanings to biological differences.
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Clara Thompson saw the most problematic phase for girls in adolescence, in the perception of differences in social constraints and power.
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Clara Thompson focuses on ways in which society frustrates or distorts basic biological drives of women.