Course: Immigration and Its Discontents: The Invisible Hand of Whiteness in Latin America
Course Description and Overview:
The instructor will explore white supremacy as it relates to the current immigration crisis and psychoanalytic practice with immigrants by weaving clinical material with interdisciplinary scholarship. In the language of economics, ‘the invisible hand,’ refers to the unseen forces of the free market economy. The “invisible hand of whiteness” in Latin America centers white supremacy as the invisible force that subjugated an entire region. We will explore how U.S.-Latin American foreign policy has contributed to the mass exodus from Central and South America in recent years. We will follow clinical case examples to highlight how the invisible hand of whiteness, foreign policy and colonization impacts the immigrants’ psyche and social functioning.
Rossanna Echegoyén, LCSW’s ancestry is a mix of Eurocentric and indigenous identities. Drawing on 18+ years clinical experience with immigrants, as well as her studies in international relations at American University, her interest lies at the intersection of psychoanalysis and socio-politics. In response to the immigration crisis, she provides immigration evaluations, more specifically to those waiting to be deported at ICE detention centers in the New York area. She is a member of Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) and is a volunteer evaluator for Weill Cornell Center for Human Rights (WCCHR) in New York City.
She is a Latina/Bilingual Psychoanalyst who is a first born American to Central American immigrants and is the first Latina Co-Director of Manhattan Institute for Psychoanalysis in New York City. She is founder and former Co-Chair of the Committee on Race and Ethnicity at MIP, Co-Founder of the Psychoanalytic Coalition for Social Justice, is on the Board of Division 39-Section 9 (“Psychoanalysis for Social Responsibility”) and is Co-Editor of The Psychoanalytic Activist. She is Faculty and Supervisor at Manhattan Institute for Psychoanalysis, NIP and The Stephen Mitchell Relational Study Center.
Manhattan Institute for Psychoanalysis is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Social Work and Psychology as an approved provider of continuing education for LCSW, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC and Licensed Psychologists.