Professor Alessandra Lemma publishes new book on AI and psychoanalysis
Psychotechnical Becomings
Psychoanalysis, Identity, Desire, and Mourning in the Age of AI and Digital Mediation
Alessandra Lemma
Psychotechnical Becomings draws on contemporary philosophy and media theory to offer a groundbreaking reimagining of psychoanalysis for the digital age, showing how technology shapes human subjectivity across all ages.
Introducing innovative concepts such as technoplasticity, psychotechnical becoming, algorithmically mediated projective identification, digital armouring, and the digital superego, the book investigates how algorithmic architectures infiltrate unconscious processes. Through vivid clinical cases and interdisciplinary theory, the book demonstrates how psychoanalytic techniques can restore depth to a flattened psychic field, tracing how identity is shaped by algorithms, desire circulates within feedback loops, and mourning unfolds in a world where absence can be endlessly deferred. The book also addresses the ethical complexities of online therapy, asking how presence and truth can be sustained in digitally configured encounters. Readers will gain a deeper understanding of how technology amplifies both defensive mechanisms and creative adaptations, requiring clinicians to engage with patients whose psychic lives are deeply entwined with digital environments.
Drawing on Lemma's extensive clinical experience, this book is key reading for psychoanalysts, psychotherapists and anyone wating to understand how technology has shaped our psychic life and identity.
'There are few contemporary psychoanalysts who have approached the transformations of digital life with the clarity, courage, and intellectual generosity of Alessandra Lemma. Psychotechnical Becomings is a landmark work.'
Peter Fonagy, Professor, University College London, UK