Mental illness and plasticity. Neuroscience, psychoanalysis and cultural critique in Catherine Malabou

Abstract

This article advances an interpretation of the books Que faire de notre cerveau? (2004), Les nouveaux blessés (2007) and Ontologie de l’accident (2009), by Catherine Malabou. In these works, the French philosopher develops an inquiry at the crossroads of psychoanalysis, neuroscience and critical thinking, which represents an original approach to theoretical and political issues of contemporary relevance. The main goal of the article is to understand the way in which Malabou links the problem of suffering with a diagnosis of the present time, and why she believes it is worthwhile to reflect on destructive plasticity, to dwell in the pure negativity, “without remedy”, of the illness.