Ian Thurston:  “We Will Not be Missed”- The Cultural Denigration of the Past as a Refusal to Mourn” 
3rd October 2026 10:30am to 1:00pm
Online Via Zoom

There is no change in urban life, even a change for the better, that does not require a process of mourning. From a psychoanalytic perspective mourning requires the relinquishment of the object of loss as an external object as a precondition for internalization within the self as a source of flexible identification. It is difficult, though, to mourn a loss which has been rendered invisible or become subject to cultural denigration. In this seminar I explore social loss and the late Jonathan Lear’s suggestion that the cultural ubiquity of the joke “We Will Not Be Missed!” may be indicative of a contemporary refusal to mourn.

About the Speaker

Ian Thurston is a Principal Adult Psychotherapist at the Department of Psychotherapy at Cumberland, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Mental Health Trust. He is a registered Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist with FIP and the UKCP and was formerly clinical lead at an acute day hospital in East London. His book “Everything is Permitted, Restrictions Still Apply – a Psychoanalytic Perspective on Social Dislocation, Narcissism and Post-Truth” was published by Routledge/Taylor Francis in 2018.

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FiP Members
Free (booking through administrator@fip.org.uk)

Non-FiP Members £35
Early Bird Booking £30 (booked before 3 September 2026)

Flyer

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