On three strands of meaning associated with the word nigger used during the course of a psychoanalytic treatment.

The author presents an overview of recent clinical/theoretical work on the construction of otherness in structured forms of hatred. He then uses clinical material to demonstrate three interwoven strands of meaning attached to the word nigger, a pejorative used frequently by a patient during the course of a psychoanalytic treatment. As used by this patient, one strand is projective and the other essentialist. The author then reflects on his own use of the pejorative in the text--a third strand of meaning he describes as depressive.