his desire to substitute for the father. She argues for a new PostOedipal stage of separation, where the metaphorical death of the parents would result in ambivalence between the joy of survival and the sadness of loss. This conscious ambivalence would guide women and menthough mainly the first- to become responsible for their own desire and own it, instead of abandoning it. Both feminists´ rich thinking pose a number of questions, relevant to body-psychotherapy: How could somatic sensations-that are psychically-inscribed through a variety of cultural processes- be described through new forms of language and imagery? How could they be symbolized from a feminine perspective and associated to the Whole? And, how would one work through the pain of separation and theoretically understand difference, if one rejects incorrect assumptions on: paternal authority and psychic liberation through paternal domination? Assumptions within Neoreichian Thought There has not been a lot of specific theoreti cal thin king on female sexuality within neoreichian bodypsychotherapy culture (7). A common ground is that sexual difference is rooted in feeling, and that women and men experience their body differently. Biology was placed at the heart of the matter by Reich, through the concept of the bi-polar nature of life processes and his ‘ functional identity and antithesis principle between psyche and soma’. His follower, Lowen (1995), showed that women would only feel penis envy if they were out of contact with the intensity of their vaginal sensations and their reproductive potency. He also emphasized how active and receptive movements during sexual intercourse, are healthy qualities found in both sexual organs and the pelvis itself. Women need aggressive movements to actively hold the penis during pelvic thrust. Men are receptive towards the flow of their own semen and towards the involuntary movements characteristic of orgasm. In this sense, he contributed to a redefinition of femininity. In many a way, Lowen (1980; 1988) advanced Reich´ s thoughts, widely documenting differences in the unfolding of the Oedipal complex within psychotherapeutic practice, among numerous cases of contemporary women and men. In his writings, he discussed the type of non-genital sexual attraction girls feel towards the opposite sex in the Oedipal phase. At that life stage, when excitation is experienced all over the body and tends to concentrate in the pelvic area, he showed girls need to have physical, loving contact and closeness with their fathers. Incorrect reading of the child´ s innocent actions, due to the parent´ s own unresolved conflicts, endangers the natural resolution of the complex and traumatizes the child. This difference with the classical Freudian reading, gives scope for therapeutically exploring more seriously women ´s memories and experiences of sexual abuse and violence. However, Lowen´ s observations have inbuilt a number of gender stereotypes. On the one hand, he argues against double standards that, “ denied women as persons and ignored the body as a source of truth” (1965, p. 161). On the other, he argues that differences between male and female values have been blurred in Occidental societies, as part of a current loss of identity. But these values are defined as a set of social constructs presented as ‘objective’, and used to establish healthy practices. His writings also deal contradictorily with evidence and interpretation, on when and how functional differences between the sexes are biological or cultural. This influences character definitions and descriptions, specially relative to the sub-characters of the Oedipal phase (the phallic-narcissistic and passive-feminine for men; the hysterical and masculine-aggressive for women), where gender becomes a key variable. The problem is not simply one of ‘names or words’- as has sometimes been argued. But it is one of scarce resort to Gender Theory. This lack tends to permeate approaches to character dynamics as a whole, including that of Stephen Johnson ´s (1994; 1985) excellent reframing. Pierrakos (1997), working from a similar framework, describes the Oedipal sub-character type of the aggressive women and men further than other neoreichian authors. These women are portrayed as having the need to dominate men, whom they simultaneously want to possess and denigrate. He compares their feelings to those of psychopathic men, who also have a substantive contempt of women. Both type of distortions are considered as a central contemporary problem and, partly, a result of the erosion of traditional gender roles. In the ‘here and now’, he argues, there is potential room for both sexes to overcome traditional roles. Pierrakos also describes the types of therapy problems that arise within this new dynamic between the sexes: most specially, the need to change aggression into self-assertion and passivity into receptivity, as both sexes are seen as distorting their ‘natural gifts’. An alternative explanation, could be that: neither traditional roles or patriarchal society has significantly changed yet, in order to embrace the true self-identity of women and men and, sufficiently facilitate, relationships based on difference between equals (8). Biology, culture and the psyche collude to reproduce the cultural subordination of female generations. Women, to break this vicious cycle, need to identify creatively ( or identify and simultaneously dis-identify), 52 Liliana Acero Feminity, Gender and Essence in Body-Psychotherapy Part I: Reflections on theory, clinical and teaching experience
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