Esperanza and the Melancholy of Otherness: A Discussion of “A Country of Two: Race and Social Class in an Immigrant Therapeutic Dyad”

Santiago Delboy’s paper, “A Country of Two,” (this issue) focuses on race and class relations in an immigrant treatment dyad. In this discussion I will further examine racial tension from the perspective of the perverse pact, the main features of which are dissociation and amnesia, and the disavowal of hatred and hostility. The perverse pact is an essential feature of White colonial culture as well as of North American White identity and it can impact the dialogue in an interracial therapy duo. I will also comment on the melancholy of Otherness in the context of race, class as well as immigration.