L’Acte de naissance de la phénoménologie psychiatrique – la traduction du Procès-verbal de la 63e assemblée de l’Association Suisse de psychiatrie

Objectives

Psychiatric phenomenology is a twentieth-century movement that, after a quiet period, is experiencing a major resurgence in both research and clinical spheres. While people often erroneously cite Karl Jaspers, in 1912, as the source of the movement, initially Husserlian in origin, others, such as Pierre Bovet and Josef Parnas, date its appearance to 1922, at the 63rd Meeting of the Swiss Psychiatric Society. Given that the meeting's minutes did not exist in French, we undertook a translation.

Methods

After retrieving the text from the Swiss Archives of Neurology and Psychiatry, we translated it into French.

Results

Our translation of this meeting's minutes shows the contributions made by Ludwig Binswanger and Eugène Minkowski to the emergence of the as-yet unpublished movement. Furthermore, we can note that several historical figures in the field of psychiatry, such as Eugen Bleuler, not only attended the event, but also took part in it.

Discussion

In addition to the translation of the two psychiatrists’ presentations, the translation of the subsequent exchanges highlights the interest and suspicion that this philosophical movement elicited from the audience of psychiatrists. Some notions, such as intuition and experience, were discussed, and questions were raised regarding the links between this approach and other disciplines, such as psychiatry itself, aesthetics, and psychoanalysis.

Conclusion

Our translation provides insight into the founding of this movement, as well as into the challenges that, based on the meeting's minutes, seem to have provoked debate from the outset.