Françoise Dolto

Françoise Dolto (1908-1988) was a pivotal figure in the psychoanalytic movement in France, particularly in the field of child psychoanalysis. Her psychoanalytic practice began in the 1930s, following her thesis "Psychoanalysis and Pediatrics," where she clinically documented the opening of Medicine to Psychoanalysis. A fundamental concept of her theoretical thinking is the unconscious image of the body, which she developed in her book of the same title in 1984. Her name is closely associated with that of Jacques Lacan. At the Freudian School of Paris, founded and directed by Lacan from 1964 to 1980, Françoise Dolto maintained the autonomy inspired by her clinical experience. In her seminars, theoretical elaboration always stemmed from the practice of the attendees and her own. Her exceptionally fruitful and rich body of work is characterized mainly by the immediacy of dialogue and opens the unique space of Psychoanalysis to the general public.