Janet O. Dallett

Listening to the Rhino: Violence and Healing in a Scientific Age Janet O. Dallett

Cultural Writing. Psychology. LISTENING TO THE RHINO uses stories, myths, and case studies to show the living reality of something deep in the psyche that resembles a large, primordial animal, a creature whose support of human agendas is not entirely reliable. This irrational part of ourselves--call it the autonomous psyche--finds expression in a multitude of contradictory ways in both the lives of individuals and the sweep of world events. Sometimes it is responsible for the miraculous healing of body and soul; at other times it perpetuates the most horrifying forms of violence. Whether it works primarily for good or for ill depends in large part on how we relate to it.