Dr Leonardo Niro
Email
l.niro@essex.ac.ukTelephone
+44 (0) 1206 872209
Location
5A.211, Colchester Campus
Biography
*I am currently on a sabbatical from the University Essex while I work towards the completion of my monographs as a Visiting Scholar at the Department of the History of Science, Harvard University (USA) and the Remarque Institute, New York University (USA)* I joined the Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies in 2013, where I currently serve as the Course Director at the MA in Psychoanalytic Studies. I led the creation of the BA Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, which I also directed from 2016-2018. I am the organiser of the Research Group in History of Psychoanalysis, an Essex-based international network of researchers studying the history of psychoanalysis. My research interests lie in the history and philosophy of the human sciences broadly construed. In June 2024, I was the co-host and programme chair of the 43rd Annual Conference of the European Society for the History of Human Sciences (ESHHS), which took place at our Colchester campus. I have extensively written on the history and philosophy of the psychological sciences (experimental psychology, psychiatry, neuroscience and psychoanalysis) from the nineteenth century to today. One question that animates my research is how authors in those disciplines justified the demarcation between the psychological sciences and the natural sciences, reflecting different views on the relation between mind and nature. My work follows a historical epistemology approach where I investigate the conceptual issues emerging from different models, metaphors, and practices employed in the conception and manipulation of the Self. I am currently involved in two research projects. The first, entitled “Freud and the Legacy of Physiology,” explores the personal, social, cultural, and theoretical impact of Freud’s engagement with physiology during his early training as a physician. Recent articles linked to this project include “Freud and the Legacy of Sensory Physiology” (published in Routledge Handbook of Philosophy and Psychoanalysis), “Evolution in the Brain, evolution in the Mind: The Hierarchical Brain and the Interface between Psychoanalysis and Neuroscience” (published in Psychoanalysis and History), and “‘Freedom within parameters’: Liberalism, (In)determinism, and the Politics of Instinct in Sigmund Exner and Sigmund Freud” (in print, History of Human Sciences). The second project, entitled “Minding Energy”, consists of a trans-national study where I explore how different psychologists, psychiatrists, neurophysiologists and depth psychologists engaged with notions of force and energy as a way of conceptualising mental phenomena – in particular, it explores the function such energetic formulations had in the emergence and constitution of psychology as an autonomous science in different contexts. A preliminary conference on the topic was organised in 2020 with colleagues from the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil. I spent the first half of 2023 working on the project during a fellowship at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (Germany), funded by the Institute of Social Research Foundation. Recent articles linked to this project include “The Conservation of Nervous Energy: Neurophysiology and Energy Conservation in the Work of Sigmund Exner and Josef Breuer” (published in Studies in History and Philosophy of Science), and “Energetics of the Mind and the Parallelismusstreit: the Assimilation of the Law of Energy Conservation in German Experimental Psychology, 1860-1915” (under review). I welcome enquiries about projects in the history and philosophy of the human sciences, psychology, psychiatry, and psychoanalysis; the interactions of the psy-disciplines with other sciences; psychoanalytic theory; and psychoanalysis and the neurosciences.
Qualifications
PhD University College London,
Appointments
University of Essex
Director of Graduate Studies, Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex (1/9/2022 - 31/8/2023)
Course Director - M.A. in Psychoanalytic Studies, Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex (1/9/2013 - present)
Course Director - B.A. in Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex (1/9/2016 - 31/8/2018)
Other academic
Visiting Scholar, Department of the History of Science, Harvard University (1/5/2024 - 30/4/2026)
Visiting Scholar, Remarque Institute, New York University (1/5/2024 - 30/4/2026)