The Nature of Trauma and Dissociation

Enactment and the formulation of dissociated experience

Here, Donnel Stern explains the significance of enactment as the interpersonalisation of dissociation, and the only way that dissociated or unformulated parts of the patient’s subjectivity can be represented. The structure of an enactment and the role of therapist as a witness via the enactment process is explained. It is via acts of recognition by the other – the therapist – that our dissociated, unformulated parts of the self become known.