Paul Parin

Born in 1916, as a Swiss citizen, in the former Habsburg Monarchy of Southern Styria, he grew up as the son of an assimilated Jewish bourgeois family of the fìn de siècle, on the family estate in Slovenia.

He studied medicine in Graz, Zagreb and received his M.D. in Zurich in 1943. During World War II, Parin was a committed anti-fascist and active in refugee-aid. From 1944 until 1945, he was on mission with a Swiss medical and sanitary organization and worked as a doctor with the Yugoslavian Liberation Army. From 1946 until 1952, Paul Parin specialized in neurology and trained in psychoanalysis in Zurich. In 1958, he was a founding member of the Psychoanalytical Seminary in Zurich.

From 1954 onwards, he undertook several scientific journeys to West Africa. With his books "Die Weissen denken zuviel; Psychoanalytische Untersuchungen bei den Dogon in West Afrika" (1963) (White men think too much; Psychoanalytic investigations among the Dogon of West Africa) and “Fear Thy Neighbor as Thyself; Psychoanalysis and Society among the Anyi of West Africa” (1980) (orig. "Fürchte deinen Nächsten wie dich selbst; Psychoanalyse und Gesellschaft am Modell der Agni in Westafrika", 1971), he - together with Goldy Parin-Matthèy and Fritz Morgenthaler - founded the scientific discipline of ethnopsychoanalysis. In the history of combining psychoanalysis and anthropology, they succeeded - for the first time - in scientifically applying the Freudian method and technique to ethnological research. Together they evaluated their ethnopsychoanalytic experiences and broadened the field of psychoanalytic theory and practice: “Der Widerspruch im Subjekt” (Contradiction in subject), 1978 and ”Subjekt im Widerspruch” (Subject in contradiction), 1986.

Today, Paul Parin works as a writer. Apart from his scientific publications and his many critical essays in politics and culture, he also published six editions of short stories. He was awarded the "Erich-Fried-Preis" in 1992; in 1997 he claimed the "Sigmund-Freud-Preis" for scientific prose of the "Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung", and in 1999 he received the "Sigmund Freud-Award of the City of Vienna". Paul Parin is an honorary doctor of Klagenfurt University in Austria. Since 1938 he has lived in Zurich. Between 1939 and 1997 he lived there with his wife Goldy Parin-Matthèy, who died in 1997.

Dr.med.Dr.h.c. Paul Parin, Utoquai 41, CH-8008 Zürich, Schweiz