Words and Transitional Phenomena in Psychotherapy

In analytic psychotherapy, language provides form for the patient’s conscious and unconscious material. Therefore, language creates a space for patient expression and a medium for therapeutic work. The space of language in analytic therapy is comparable to Winnicott’s transitional space. The transitional space of language is independent of the number of languages the patient uses in therapy but transitional space of language is made particularly manifest during the moments of language switch. Paying close attention to language switch during therapy may reveal the transitional space of language, the special words with transitional object qualities and, finally, the symbolic functions of language.