A case for a “middle-way career” in the history of psychology: The work of pioneering psychoanalyst Marjorie Brierley in early 20th century Britain.

Abstract

Historians often focus on the most famous or radical, prolific theoreticians among psychoanalysts, thereby at times reproducing the self-centered biases of their subjects rather than providing a useful critique. I offer instead a revisionist view of this history of psychology, arguing that we should pay more attention to a variety of middle-way actors who combined diverse forms of often-dismissed labor that included practice, editorial, and administrative work, and who tried to find a less rigid theoretical middle ground to toil. These middle-way actors were often women and although scholars have commented on the prominence of women in the early societies of psychoanalysis, we have not conducted adequate research on all these early active members and their roles. This article presents an example of such an actor, Marjorie Brierley (1893Brierley ( -1984, one of the first women psychoanalysts in Britain who made unique, yet unresearched, varied contributions-intellectual and non-intellectual-to the famous interwar debate on femininity and to organizational and clinical work. If we are to fully understand the establishment, cultivation, and maintenance of the flourishing field of psychoanalysis in the early 20th century, we must account for the work of women like her.