Radio Curious revisits a conversation with âPrimal Screamâ founder Dr. Arthur Janov, who died on October 1, 2017. The therapeutic method promoted by he and his partner Dr. France Janov was debunked by the psychiatric establishment.
Barry Vogel, Attorney and Counselor, is the Host and Producer of Radio Curious. Christina Aanestad is the Assistant Producer.
In this edition of Radio Curious we re-visit our December 2006 interview with Dr. Arthur Janov, author of The Primal Scream,  who died on October 1, 2017, at his home in Malibu, California. A detailed obituary may be found in the October 4, 2017, on line edition of the New York Times. (https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/10/02/obituaries/arthur-janov-dead-developed-primal-scream-therapy.html)
Together with his wife Dr. France Janov, they asserted that the best emotional healing is obtained by reaching back to the point of injury that formed an initial imprint of the pain, claiming that pain often originates in the womb or in early childhood. Their work centered on a belief that repeated piercing screams focused on early trauma would free a person of physical and psychological pain.Â
Their therapeutic method has been repeatedly debunked and discredited by colleagues and the psychiatric establishment, as described in the journal âProfessional Psychology: Research and Practice,â and the American Psychiatric Association. The criticism focused on the lack of any independent, controlled studies demonstrating the Janov therapyâs effectiveness. Janov also listed homosexuality among the ailments that primal therapy could âcure,â and continued to list it long after the American Psychiatric Association declassified it as a psychiatric disorder in 1973.Nonetheless, his patients included John Lennon, Yoko Ono, James Earl Jones and the pianist Roger Williams.
I spoke with Dr. Arthur Janov and Dr. France Janov, in December 2006, from their home in Santa Monica, California, and began when I asked them to explain how initial imprints in a personâs life can be the cause of lifelong pain.
The books Dr. Arthur Janov recommended are:Â âHostile Takeover: How Big Money and Corruption Conquered Our Government--And How We Take It Back,â by Davod Sirota, and âOverthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq,â by Steven Kinzer.Â
The books Dr. France Janov recommended are: âMatisse,â Â by Volkmar Essers, and âPuccini: A Biographyâ by Mary Jane Phillips-Matz and William Weaver.
This program was recorded on December 16, 2006.
Radio Curious is a half-hour, weekly, long-form interview program, now in its 27th year. We interview people on a curiously wide variety of topics about life and ideas. Our website is www.radiocurious.org. If your station airs Radio Curious please let us know curious@radiocurious.org, we will add you to our list of syndicate stations. We also welcome questions, feedback and program ideas. Radio Curious 280 N. Oak St. Ukiah, Ca 95482. (707) 462-6541.
Remembering the Debunked "Primal Scream" Founder
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