Conferences
Aurora Liiceanu – The Discomfort of Psychologists: Uncertainties and Hesitations
On Sunday, 1st April 2018, from 11.00 a.m., the NTB Painting Hall shall host the conference The Discomfort of Psychologists: Uncertainties and Hesitations given by Aurora Liiceanu.
About the conference
„It seems that one cannot really talk about the future, as long as the major topic of the present in all aspects of life is change. Sociologists ascertain that there are social tendencies to worry about, psychologists are more restricted because the individual has a single life and he must know what to do with it. The civilization of the present has obvious features, the system of values is shifting, we are living in individualism, in the culture of the ego, in a world of casualness and pleasure, of frivolous life, entertainment takes up our time, everything is a show, the world of emotions leaves reason behind, to gasp for regaining its increasingly lost importance.
What can psychologists do if society urges us through seduction and marketing to hedonism, narcissism and heroisation, to the refusal of the anonymity of the past, when the generation gap rises rapidly and when fluid identity becomes something natural once the dizzying evolution of technology and sexuality shows us ever so new possibilities of expression? The individual faces the horror of unemployment, loneliness and incurable diseases, poverty and the break-up of traditional family, as it used to be, a paradise, but also an inferno, torn between options, because he/she must assume choices, be responsible, manage.
The inflation of information and the multiple lifestyle alternatives face the individual with difficult choices. The theme of psychologists is the pressure towards change and fluidity of identity. Technology, even beyond communication, and sexuality are topics currently challenging the individual, but also the main causes of the generation gap.”
About Aurora Liiceanu
PhD in Psychology and senior researcher at the „Constantin Rădulescu-Motru” Institute for Philosophy and Psychology of the Romanian Academy. Founding member of the Romanian Academic Society (SAR) and of the Journal of Loss and Trauma (USA), she taught and collaborated with various universities from Bucharest and abroad (UQAM- Canada and EHESS – France), he was a member of international doctoral juries (EHESS –France and Laval University – Canada) and of the Civil Society jury of our country. She published numerous books, the majority thereof at Polirom Publishing.
She collaborated extensively with the written press and participated in TV shows on issues related to the psychology of interpersonal relations, criminology etc. She took part as an expert and consultant in many social campaigns organized by NGOs and multinational companies regarding health, civic attitude, personality building and development. In the time frame 2002-2004, she was a national correspondent in Strasbourg for the European study on daily violence, and from 2004-2005 she was a national coordinator of the AGIS European project regarding juvenile violence.
In 2005 and 2006, she received awards for cultural merits bestowed by the Bucharest Municipality and the Romanian Peasant Museum, and in 2011, she received the Romanian Academy award for publishing a tome on social violence. In 2008, she received the BBW Community Leadership Award for research and counselling in the field of human and community relations. Since 1999 to the present day, she worked on educational programmes („The Decision is Mine”, „My Life: A Serious ‘Game’”, “Among Us, Parents”), supported by the Ministry of Education, and in 2007, together with UNICEF, she participated in a national study, drafted in a collective, regarding school violence in Romania.
Translated by Simona Nichiteanu
