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Ben Levenson
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Email
bl26993@essex.ac.uk -
Location
Colchester Campus
Profile
Biography
Ben Levenson is a psychoanalytic researcher and psychotherapist whose work explores the relationship between social conditions, masculinity, and psychic life. His current research examines loneliness and social atomization among men, drawing on object relations and interpersonal psychoanalysis to develop a socially engaged theory of masculine subjectivity. His work asks how contemporary forms of isolation shape mens unconscious fantasies, sense of self, relationships, and experience of masculinity. Ben holds a masters degree in psychoanalytic psychotherapy from the Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis, he maintains an active practice with adolscents, adults, and couples at Aurora Counseling in Natick, MA and has conducted psychodynamic research at Cambridge Health Alliance, a Harvard Medical School teaching hospital. Before entering clinical and academic work, he spent a decade in community organizing and grassroots social movements focused on racial, economic, and global justice. His research brings together psychoanalytic theory, social and political theory, and clinical experience to examine the psychological consequences of changing forms of community and social connection.
Qualifications
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Masters Degree Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis (2025)
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Bachelor's of Arts Princeton University (2013)
Research and professional activities
Thesis
Lonely Masculinities
Loneliness has become a defining social concern in contemporary Western societies, increasingly linked to declining community institutions, social isolation, mental illness, political alienation, and the rise of reactionary forms of masculinity. The project develops a socially engaged and historically situated theory of masculine loneliness. The project focuses on the psychological effects of loneliness: how prolonged disconnection may shape men’s fantasies, relationships, sense of self, and exp