Robi Friedman
Biographic Data
| ID | 4589116 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Robi Friedman |
| GIVEN NAMES | Robi |
| FAMILY NAME | Friedman |
| SIGNATURE | FRIEDMAN R |
| AFFILIATIONS | Israel Institute for Group Analysis, Haifa University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3094-8340 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 31 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 9 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 31 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2000 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Response to Litsa Rose Biggs ‘Thoughts on resonance: Valency, dreams and a-causality’
Response to Erica Burman. The Soldier’s Matrix and Nirel’s missing head
Dreamtelling: The value of dreaming and sharing dreams in relations: Part I: From collective preoccupations to shared dreaming
This article looks at the group approach to shared dreams following previous publications, including Dreams In Group Psychotherapy: Theory and Technique (Neri et al. 2002) and further papers 1 , and a natural extension to a 2022 publication (Friedman, 2022). One innovative perspective is the notion that it is often a ‘collective preoccupation’ which starts a group’s shared elaboration process (dreaming), which to begin with is transmitted through…
Dreamtelling: The value of dreaming and sharing dreams in relations: Part II: The practice of a group analytic approach to shared dreams
After having described communicational and relational characteristics of dreaming and sharing dreams, in Part II, I provide deeper exploration of a clinical example in group-analytic group therapy, describing group work with a dream. The uniqueness of the group-analytic approach to the dream’s contents and its communicative aspect will be stressed. Requests for containment preoccupy relations and participants and should be elaborated during the d…
The Rough Road: A Single Case Study of Dreamtelling in a Group during the Covid-19 Pandemic and Military Conflict
Sharing dreams is a common practice, and several motives, such as emotional processing, emotional relief, and request for containment, have been identified. An exploratory single case study research design was used to explore the experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic and local military conflict among a group of Israeli students. The group discussed a dream previously shared in social network sites during the first COVID-19 lockdown. A qualitative …
Malcolm Pines
Turkey’s soldier’s matrix: Fighting against internal threats and external enemies
This paper examines the role of government-controlled media in provoking the current wave of religious/nationalism in Turkey. We use Friedman’s concept of the Soldier’s Matrix and Volkan’s large group identity as analytical lenses to explain how Turkey’s society is propped up in a constant state of fear driven by an imagined existential threat and promised glory. We argue that the Erdoğan administration fuels polarization instrumentalizes the Sev…
The religious potential of ‘trusting’. A response to Luiker’s ‘The anti-science in the culture of group analysis’ parts one and two
Commentary on Christoph Seidler’s article: East goes West — West goes East: border crossing and development
Id-training in action—or learning to love in the GAG? Response to Doron
Beyond rejection, glory and the Soldier’s Matrix: The heart of my group analysis
During my 45 year journey in the different approaches to psychotherapy, an interest in small, median and later in large groups have influenced me professionally. Many in the Israel IGA had a similar professional history until we finally felt group analysis as our home. I also learned from experiences of rejection and glory. A Trauma-Glory continuum, connected to rejection and inclusion, will be discussed. Glory, which is considered a basic social…
Questions of Communication and Process. Commentary on Billow’s Relational Group Psychotherapy: An Overview. Part III: Modes of Therapeutic Leadership, September 2017
Response to ‘On the Functions of Dreamtelling in the Context of Group Dynamics’, September 2017
Obituary—Benjamin Rippa (1930–2017): Benni as We Knew Him
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2016: President’s Introduction
Using the Transpersonal in Dreamtelling and Conflict
The transpersonal may be considered a relational mechanism, which connects people through the boundary permeability and reciprocity of influence in the matrix. The transpersonal perspective enriches our understanding of the potential conscious and unconscious communication in groups, especially in working with dreams. Inter- and intrapersonal dimensions complement each other in three uses of dreaming and dreamtelling: the informative, the formati…
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2015 President’s Introduction
The Internationalisation Process of GAS: From GAS (London) to GAS International. A Common Reflection
A Soldier’s Matrix: A Group Analytic View of Societies in War
In this article 1 I will discuss the question of violence in (large) groups and the relationship between the mass and the individual selves. This will be done through the concept of the ‘soldier’s matrix’ 2 . I refer to a matrix dominating a whole society, which participates in organized aggression and suffers its emotional consequences. Everybody in the matrix becomes a soldier, and the identity or the ‘Habitus’ (Elias, 1989) of the society is i…
Group Analysis Today—Developments in Intersubjectivity
S.H. Foulkes may be considered a pioneer of intersubjective thinking by developing concepts like ‘transpersonal’ and ‘location’. Group analysis has thus always been connected to the main understandings of the modern relational approach. Reciprocity, mutuality, the collective mind, dreamtelling, self-disclosure and other concepts will be discussed as ingredients of the group analytic practice
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2014 President’s Introduction
The 37th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture: President’s Introduction, 3-4 May 2013
Individual or Group Therapy? Indications for Optimal Therapy
Different therapeutic modalities have differential value in curing disorders. Group therapy and individual therapy may be complementary rather than alternative approaches; thus in therapeutic reality—both may be a ‘must’ in order for one to develop and get healthy. The unique advantages of small and median groups in the optimal treatment of personal and interpersonal patterns should be used in order to revise our therapy indication system
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2012: President’s Introduction
Conducting a Large group: Is it ‘Informative’ or is it also ‘Transformative’? Comments to Teresa von Sommaruga Howard’s Large Group in New Zealand
A Soldier’s Matrix: A Group Analytic View of Societies in War
In this article 1 I will discuss the question of violence in (large) groups and the relationship between the mass and the individual selves. This will be done through the concept of the ‘soldier’s matrix’ 2 . I refer to a matrix dominating a whole society, which participates in organized aggression and suffers its emotional consequences. Everybody in the matrix becomes a soldier, and the identity or the ‘Habitus’ (Elias, 1989) of the society is i…
Turkey’s soldier’s matrix: Fighting against internal threats and external enemies
This paper examines the role of government-controlled media in provoking the current wave of religious/nationalism in Turkey. We use Friedman’s concept of the Soldier’s Matrix and Volkan’s large group identity as analytical lenses to explain how Turkey’s society is propped up in a constant state of fear driven by an imagined existential threat and promised glory. We argue that the Erdoğan administration fuels polarization instrumentalizes the Sev…
Response to Erica Burman. The Soldier’s Matrix and Nirel’s missing head
The Interpersonal Containment of Dreams in Group Psychotherapy: A Contribution to the Work with Dreams in a Group
The aim of this contribution is to add some theoretical and practical perspectives to the work with dreams. In the first part I will try to add another aspect to dream-theory, and in the second I will present a clinical vignette as illustration. Dreaming is mainly (though not exclusively) an intrapersonal matter; which Freud - and ego and Self psychology after him - researched and elaborated upon. But dream- telling (and even creating a dream to …
The Interpersonal Containment of Dreams in Group Psychotherapy: A Contribution to the Work with Dreams in a Group
Dream-telling as a Request for Containment - Reconsidering the Group-Analytic Approach to the Work with Dreams
Differentiating between diagnostic aspects in dreaming, as representing autonomous containment, and the interpersonal event of dream-telling, reveals its intersubjective functions. Dream-telling may both be a request for the group’s help to process difficulties and an effort to influence relationships. In this article, the conductor’s work with dreams is reconsidered and technical consequences on the work with dreams for group-analytic practice d…
Special Section: Where to look? Supervising Group Analysis — A Relations Disorder Perspective
Thinking in interpersonal terms rather than intra-psychic processes may not be easy. A further move in this direction seems cardinal in the development of conductors of group therapy. Handling questions of the optimal therapeutic environment for patients encounters great difficulties because of the lamentable scarcity of indications for group therapy. The unsatisfactory situation of indications is also true for individual psychotherapy. This arti…
The Group and the Individual in Conflict and War
This article is an expression of gratitude to Malcolm Pines who has been both a personal mentor and a robust supporter of the Israeli Institute for Group Analysis. The firm friendship which we developed, as well as his strong links with Israel and his wish to see us well, secure and developing are a source of great comfort. I would not have started to write at all if he had not provided encouragement over a decade ago. Thus this article is not on…
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2012: President’s Introduction
Conducting a Large group: Is it ‘Informative’ or is it also ‘Transformative’? Comments to Teresa von Sommaruga Howard’s Large Group in New Zealand
Dreamtelling and Meeting the ‘Other’. A Conflicting German–Jewish Dialogue
Post-war, German generations continue to foster an elaboration of guilt and shame. One seminar approaches this difficult subject through a process of mourning, separation from parental position, and transgenerational elaboration of previously uncontained emotions (or what has been called coping with ‘the past in the present’) (Sandler, 1987). This may be described as an encounter between ‘me’, the ego-syntonic aspects of the Self, and the inexcus…
The 37th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture: President’s Introduction, 3-4 May 2013
Individual or Group Therapy? Indications for Optimal Therapy
Different therapeutic modalities have differential value in curing disorders. Group therapy and individual therapy may be complementary rather than alternative approaches; thus in therapeutic reality—both may be a ‘must’ in order for one to develop and get healthy. The unique advantages of small and median groups in the optimal treatment of personal and interpersonal patterns should be used in order to revise our therapy indication system
Group Analysis Today—Developments in Intersubjectivity
S.H. Foulkes may be considered a pioneer of intersubjective thinking by developing concepts like ‘transpersonal’ and ‘location’. Group analysis has thus always been connected to the main understandings of the modern relational approach. Reciprocity, mutuality, the collective mind, dreamtelling, self-disclosure and other concepts will be discussed as ingredients of the group analytic practice
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2014 President’s Introduction
Using the Transpersonal in Dreamtelling and Conflict
The transpersonal may be considered a relational mechanism, which connects people through the boundary permeability and reciprocity of influence in the matrix. The transpersonal perspective enriches our understanding of the potential conscious and unconscious communication in groups, especially in working with dreams. Inter- and intrapersonal dimensions complement each other in three uses of dreaming and dreamtelling: the informative, the formati…
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2015 President’s Introduction
The Internationalisation Process of GAS: From GAS (London) to GAS International. A Common Reflection
A Soldier’s Matrix: A Group Analytic View of Societies in War
In this article 1 I will discuss the question of violence in (large) groups and the relationship between the mass and the individual selves. This will be done through the concept of the ‘soldier’s matrix’ 2 . I refer to a matrix dominating a whole society, which participates in organized aggression and suffers its emotional consequences. Everybody in the matrix becomes a soldier, and the identity or the ‘Habitus’ (Elias, 1989) of the society is i…
Th S.H. Foulkes Annual Lecture, 2016: President’s Introduction
Questions of Communication and Process. Commentary on Billow’s Relational Group Psychotherapy: An Overview. Part III: Modes of Therapeutic Leadership, September 2017
Response to ‘On the Functions of Dreamtelling in the Context of Group Dynamics’, September 2017
Obituary—Benjamin Rippa (1930–2017): Benni as We Knew Him
Id-training in action—or learning to love in the GAG? Response to Doron
Beyond rejection, glory and the Soldier’s Matrix: The heart of my group analysis
During my 45 year journey in the different approaches to psychotherapy, an interest in small, median and later in large groups have influenced me professionally. Many in the Israel IGA had a similar professional history until we finally felt group analysis as our home. I also learned from experiences of rejection and glory. A Trauma-Glory continuum, connected to rejection and inclusion, will be discussed. Glory, which is considered a basic social…
Commentary on Christoph Seidler’s article: East goes West — West goes East: border crossing and development
The religious potential of ‘trusting’. A response to Luiker’s ‘The anti-science in the culture of group analysis’ parts one and two
The Rough Road: A Single Case Study of Dreamtelling in a Group during the Covid-19 Pandemic and Military Conflict
Sharing dreams is a common practice, and several motives, such as emotional processing, emotional relief, and request for containment, have been identified. An exploratory single case study research design was used to explore the experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic and local military conflict among a group of Israeli students. The group discussed a dream previously shared in social network sites during the first COVID-19 lockdown. A qualitative …
Psychology (27 works) · Psychoanalysis (20 works) · Psychotherapy Techniques and Applications (18 works) · Social Psychology (17 works) · Social Psychology (10 works) · Sociology (10 works) · Group analysis (9 works) · Counseling, Therapy, and Family Dynamics (7 works) · Interpersonal communication (7 works) · Psychotherapist (7 works)