Miller, Jean Baker 1927-2006

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born September 29, 1927, in New York, NY; died July 29, 2006, in Brookline, MA. Psychiatrist, educator, and author. A pioneer in the field of relational psychology, Miller was well known as the author of Towards a New Psychology of Women (1976; 2nd edition, 1986), which convincingly argued against Freudian notions that characteristically feminine traits such as nurturing and emotional bonding were weaknesses. Stricken with polio when she was a year old, Miller underwent numerous operations and physical therapy for years as a child. During one life-changing visit to a hospital, however, she was encouraged by two nurses to attend Hunter College High School, a special school for women. Miller's parents agreed to the proposal, and the young student did well there. She then won a scholarship to Sarah Lawrence College, graduating in 1948. Unlike most of her peers, however, Miller was not satisfied with the prospects of being a secretary or clerk after graduation, and so she applied to medical school at Columbia University. Here she earned an M.D. in 1952, followed by several residencies at such institutions as the Bellevue Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine. During the late 1950s, she completed psychoanalytic training at New York Medical College. Miller established a private practice while also teaching. During the 1960s and 1970s, she was a psychiatry instructor at the Upstate Medical Center at the University of the State of New York and then at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Very aware that she was a woman in a male-dominated profession, Miller saw that academic theories in psychology and psychiatry had a clearly masculine perspective. The result was that, when it came to diagnosing women, there was an unfair bias about what was normal and what was abnormal. This was reflected, too, in the terminology used by psychiatrists. For example, male psychiatrists used words such as "manipulation" and "dependency" instead of what Miller defined as merely "relationships" or "nurturing." Psychological states that reflected women's empathy and emotions were defined as abnormal by male scientists, while Miller strongly felt that the traits of a woman's natural personality should be seen as beneficial, not harmful. The arguments Miller developed were central in what has become known as "relational psychology" or "relationalcultural theory." It was this subject that she clarified in her most influential work, Towards a New Psychology of Women. Her theories would prove to be more effective in diagnosing and treating women suffering from depression, as well as other mental and emotional problems. Miller would also later coauthor Women's Growth in Connection: Writings from the Stone Center (1991) and The Healing Connection: How Women Form Relationships in Therapy and in Life (1993). Turning more and more to teaching, in her later career she was a clinical professor of psychiatry at the Boston University School of Medicine and a lecturer in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Beginning in the 1970s, she also worked with psychotherapist Irene P. Stiver and psychologist Judith Jordan, creating a forum to help dispel male-dominated views in the profession. In 1981, Miller joined the faculty at Wellesley College in Massachusetts, and she was director of the Stone Center for Developmental Services and Studies. In 1995, the Jean Baker Miller Training Institute was established in her honor, and Miller served as its director until 2005. During her later years in life, Miller suffered increasingly from emphysema and post-polio syndrome.

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Chicago Tribune, August 5, 2006, section 2, p. 10.

Los Angeles Times, August 4, 2006, p. B8.

New York Times, August 8, 2006, p. A19.