Dr Noreen Giffney

Overview

Life Before Ulster

Dr Noreen Giffney BA Hons, PhD, MSc, Clin Dip, MIFPP, MICP, BPC Founding Scholar, SFHEA is a psychoanalytic psychotherapist and a psychosocial theorist. Before taking up the position of Lecturer in Counselling and Psychotherapy at Ulster University in 2017, she taught at a number of universities in Ireland and the UK, including University College Dublin, Trinity College Dublin, the University of Limerick, and Birkbeck, University of London.

Noreen has worked in the third-level sector since 1997. She specialises in the fields of psychoanalysis; psychosocial studies; the arts, culture and mental health/creative health; and gender and sexuality studies. She is a Founding Scholar of the British Psychoanalytic Council (BPC), a member of the Advisory Board of the Association for Psychosocial Studies (APS), a member of the International Association for Forensic Psychotherapy (IAPF), and a fully-accredited clinical member of the Irish Forum for Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy (IFPP) and the Psychoanalytic Section of the Irish Council for Psychotherapy (ICP).

Teaching

Noreen is committed to facilitating students learning from experience through developing their observation and analytical skills and their capacity for self-awareness, self-reflectivity and insight. She has a particular interest in reflective practice.

Noreen specialises in teaching psychoanalytic and psychosocial theories with the use of cultural objects (film, art, literature, music, virtual reality) as case studies. She formulated and developed the “Cultural Encounters Case Study Method”, which brings together clinical concepts and cultural objects as creative sites for playing with ideas through encounter and experience. In opening up spaces for thinking and feeling, the Method provides opportunities to work towards integrating theoretical knowledge with capacities and skills required for clinical practice.

Noreen welcomes enquiries from prospective PhD students and postdoctoral fellows interested in undertaking theoretical and/or qualitative research in one of the following fields: psychoanalysis; psychosocial studies; the arts, culture and mental health/creative health; gender and sexuality studies.

Noreen has performed External Examiner duties at the University of Edinburgh, the London School of Economics, the University of Roehampton, the University of Essex, Bournemouth University and Birkbeck, University of London. She is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA).

Research

Noreen’s interdisciplinary research is situated at the intersection between the arts and culture and mental health. Her work focuses more specifically on bringing together clinical psychoanalysis and the field of psychosocial studies to explore the formative impact of cultural experiences on our developing subjectivity and their continued emotional and psychological importance throughout our lives. She is the author of the book, “The Culture-Breast in Psychoanalysis: Cultural Experiences and the Clinic” (Routledge 2021).

Noreen was a member of the creative team (led by Professor Jill Bennett) for “World Comes Alive” (fEEL 2025), the first Virtual Reality (VR) experience underpinned by psychoanalytic thinking. She is especially interested in how emerging technologies, such as VR, Augmented Reality (AR) and Mixed Reality (MR), might be incorporated into clinical training and further professional development contexts for extending and refining skills and capacities for reflective practice. She is making an animated short film, “Cultural Encounters”, with illustrator and animator, Allen Fatimaharan, about the psychological nourishment provided by cultural experiences.

Noreen is also interested in the impact of psychosocial factors on the unconscious dynamics – transference and countertransference – underpinning the analytic relationship. She is the editor, with Dr Eve Watson, of “Clinical Encounters in Sexuality: Psychoanalytic Practice and Queer Theory” (Punctum Books 2017).

Noreen is the Editor-in-Chief, with Emmanuelle Smith, of “New Associations” psychoanalytic magazine, which is published three times per year by the British Psychoanalytic Council and makes use of psychoanalytic thinking to reflect on social, cultural and political issues. She has published many peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, co-edited a further five books on feminist and queer theories of gender and sexuality, and held editing positions with international publishers: Contributing Editor, “Studies in Gender & Sexuality” (Routledge); Series Co-Editor, “Queer Interventions” book series (Ashgate); and Humanities Book Review Editor, “GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian & Gay Studies” (Duke University Press).

Noreen has been invited to give talks about her research to clinical, academic and public audiences based in Ireland, the UK, Belgium, Austria, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Turkey, the USA, Canada, Australia and India.

Civic Roles

Noreen is the Director of “Psychoanalysis +” (2013- ), an international, interdisciplinary initiative that brings together clinical, academic and artistic approaches to, and applications of, psychoanalysis. Large public events have taken place in, for example, the National Museum of Decorative Arts and History in Dublin, the Freud Museum in London, the Science Gallery in Dublin, the Birkbeck Centre for Contemporary Theatre in London, the Metropolitan Arts Centre (MAC) in Belfast, Filmbase in Dublin, the Institute of Group Analysis in London, IMMA – The Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin, and the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust in London.

Noreen has been a member of clinical committees, including the Education Sub-Committee, the Trauma Working Group, and (as Chair) the Accreditation Review Working Group in the Irish Forum for Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy. She is a member of the Professional Advisory Group for the Irish Council for Psychotherapy’s response to proposed standards for the state regulation of the psychotherapy profession in Ireland.

Noreen was the Director, with Michael O’Rourke, of “The(e)ories: Critical Theory & Sexuality Studies” (2002-2013), which brought many of the world’s most eminent theorists of sexuality and gender to Ireland. She currently convenes the international, interdisciplinary “Psychoanalysis and the Psychosocial Discussion Group”.