Daniel Pick is a British historian,

psychoanalyst PsychoanalysisFrom Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious processes and their influence on conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on dream interpretation, psychoanalysis is also a talk th ...

, university teacher, writer and occasional broadcaster. Between 2014 and 2021, he was the recipient of a senior Investigator grant from the

Wellcome Trust The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome (founder of Burroughs Wellcome, one of the predec ...

and led a research group at Birkbeck exploring the history of the

human science Human science (or human sciences in the plural) studies the philosophical, biological, social, justice, and cultural aspects of human life. Human science aims to expand the understanding of the human world through a broad interdisciplinary approa ...

s and 'psy' professions during the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

. The project was entitled 'Hidden Persuaders': Brainwashing, Culture, Clinical Knowledge and the Cold War Human Sciences, c. 1950-1990'. He read English at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

, before taking a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

in History. He is Professor of History at

Birkbeck College, University of London Birkbeck, University of London (formally Birkbeck College, University of London), is a public research university located in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. Established in 1823 as the London Mechanics' ...

, a fellow and training analyst of the

British Psychoanalytical Society The British Psychoanalytical Society was founded by Ernest Jones as the London Psychoanalytical Society on 30 October 1913. It is one of several organisations in Britain training psychoanalysts. The society has been home to a number of psych ...

and author of numerous articles and several books on modern cultural history, psychoanalysis, and the history of the human sciences. These include ''Faces of Degeneration'' (CUP, 1989), ''The Pursuit of the Nazi Mind'' (OUP, 2012). and ''Brainwashed: A New History of Thought Control'' (Profile/Wellcome Collection, 2022) He has written and taught at

London University The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degr ...

for many years, on aspects of the history of

psychoanalysis PsychoanalysisFrom Greek language, Greek: and is a set of theories and techniques of research to discover unconscious mind, unconscious processes and their influence on conscious mind, conscious thought, emotion and behaviour. Based on The Inte ...

and

psychiatry Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of deleterious mental disorder, mental conditions. These include matters related to cognition, perceptions, Mood (psychology), mood, emotion, and behavior. ...

modernism Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

, the relationship of Freudian thought to

historiography Historiography is the study of the methods used by historians in developing history as an academic discipline. By extension, the term ":wikt:historiography, historiography" is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiog ...

Victorian Victorian or Victorians may refer to: 19th century * Victorian era, British history during Queen Victoria's 19th-century reign ** Victorian architecture ** Victorian house ** Victorian decorative arts ** Victorian fashion ** Victorian literatur ...

evolutionary theory,

eugenics Eugenics is a set of largely discredited beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter the frequency of various human phenotypes by inhibiting the fer ...

and

social Darwinism Charles Darwin, after whom social Darwinism is named Social Darwinism is a body of pseudoscientific theories and societal practices that purport to apply biological concepts of natural selection and survival of the fittest to sociology, economi ...

, ideas of war and peace, fin-de-siècle literature, and the history of cultural attitudes to crime and madness. He is an associate editor of

History Workshop Journal The ''History Workshop Journal'' is a British academic history journal published by Oxford University Press. ''History Workshop'' was founded in 1976 by Raphael Samuel and others involved in the History Workshop movement. Originally sub-titled " ...

. Pick has presented a number of radio programmes, for the BBC, including 'The Unconscious Life of Bombs’,

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

(December 2017); ‘Dictators on the Couch’, BBC Radio 4 (June 2017); and ‘Freud for our Times’, BBC Radio 4 (December 2016).

Selected works

* Brainwashed: A New History of Thought Control (Profile/Wellcome Collection, 2022) * Co-editor (with Matt ffytche), ''Psychoanalysis in the Age of Totalitarianism'' (

Routledge Routledge ( ) is a British multinational corporation, multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, academic journals, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanit ...

, 2016) * ''Psychoanalysis: A Very Short Introduction'' (

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, 2015) * ''The Pursuit of the Nazi Mind: Hitler, Hess and the Analysts'' (Oxford University Press, 2012); paperback (2014) * ''Rome or Death: The Obsessions of General Garibaldi'' (

Jonathan Cape Jonathan Cape is a British publishing firm headquartered in London and founded in 1921 by Herbert Jonathan Cape, who was head of the firm until his death. Cape and his business partner Wren Howard (1893–1968) set up the publishing house in ...

, 2005; Pimlico 2006) * Co-editor (with Lyndal Roper), ''Dreams and History: The Interpretation of Dreams from Ancient Greece to Modern Psychoanalysis'' (Routledge, 2004) * ''Svengali's Web: The Alien Enchanter in Modern Culture'',

Yale University Press Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day and Clarence Day, grandsons of Benjamin Day, and became a department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and ope ...

, 2000 * Edited and introduced George Du Maurier's novel ''Trilby'' (

Penguin Classics Penguin Classics is an imprint (trade name), imprint of Penguin Books under which classic works of literature are published in English language, English, Spanish language, Spanish, Portuguese language, Portuguese, and Korean language, Korean amon ...

, 1994) * ''War Machine: The Rationalisation of Slaughter in the Modern Age'' (Yale University Press, 1993) * ''Faces of Degeneration: A European Disorder, c. 1848-c.1918'',

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press was the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted a letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it was the oldest university press in the world. Cambridge University Press merged with Cambridge Assessme ...

, 1989

References

External links

‘The Psychiatrist and the Deputy Fuhrer’, BBC Radio 4

‘Nazism and Psychoanalysis in the 1940s and Beyond’, Freud Museum

‘On Psychoanalysis and Fascism’

'The Roots of Extremism’, BBC Radio 4 (March 2014)'

Hidden Persuaders project website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pick, Daniel Academics of Birkbeck, University of London British psychoanalysts History of mental health in the United Kingdom