The controversial conference

Article by Yannick Delneste published in Sud Ouest (Rive droite edition) on 5 February 2010. It reports the cancellation, in Carbon-Blanc, of a conference organised by the association Lien parental around the Tomatis-inspired “psycho-pedagogy of listening”, and the calling into question of a municipal subsidy. This article — a critical one — is reproduced here as part of the public reception of the method; it is accompanied by the biographical box published in the margin.

Sud Ouest — Gironde, Rive droite, Friday 5 February 2010

The controversial conference cancelled

LIEN PARENTAL — The public meeting was to host a Bordeaux practice relaying the contested methods of Doctor Tomatis

Lack of attention, relationship difficulties, psychosomatic imbalances, lack of self-confidence, dizziness, hyperactivity, depression, or even developmental delay: “This conference is intended for children as much as for parents encountering the problems set out. Come along, you will be surprised by what is going to be said…”

The leaflets and posters for the conference organised by Lien parental had been distributed for a few weeks in the commune. After more “classic” subjects such as abuse or dangerous games, the association based in Carbon-Blanc, after Floirac, will not in the end be hosting this evening Danièle and Joël Fromenteau, heads of the audio-psycho-phonological practice located on rue Brochon in Bordeaux.

A method that causes concern

The couple develop what they call a “psycho-pedagogy of listening”, initiated by Alfred Tomatis, an ear, nose and throat specialist who died in 2001, but whose controversial methods are still being applied through the “Tomatis method”, explains Razika Daut, one of the two permanent employees of Lien parental.

“As there was a Bordeaux relay, I thought it might interest other parents.” Except that the poster, the terms used and the information gathered set several Carbon-Blanc residents coughing, and they grew more and more uneasy as the days went by.

“I have followed the action and conferences of the Lien for a long time and I thought it was very good,” one of them recounts. “But the theme of this conference made me wince.”

The municipal council voted, last March, a subsidy of 2,000 euros for 2009. But at the town hall, they too ended up wincing: “We had a discussion with the association last week,” explains Jeannine Thore, the first deputy mayor in charge of solidarity, education and early childhood. “[…] We consider that this theme is too specialised and that this conference would have developed unrecognised educational tools.”

Subsidy called into question

A few days ago, the association finally let the town hall know that the conference would not take place. And the municipal financial support for this association could be called into question, on the grounds of “differing objectives”.

For the secretary general of Info-sectes, Bernard Proux, “it is indeed an unrecognised pedagogy, but above all a financial scam.” Being “psycho-pedagogical”, the services provided by the Fromenteau practice are not reimbursed by Social Security. A first child/adolescent assessment is billed at 95 euros, an adult assessment at 77 euros. Courses are then offered on a regular basis.

Yannick Delneste

Box: Alfred Tomatis

A doctor of medicine in 1945, Alfred Tomatis acquired both a worldwide and a highly contested reputation, which led to his being struck off the Order of Physicians (even though he always maintained that he had resigned in the mid-1970s). Having died in 2001, he left behind a “multinational” of Tomatis centres, where therapists, trained in Belgium at the Mozart Brain Lab, practise his method, audio-psycho-phonology.

Source: Yannick Delneste, “La conférence controversée annulée”, Sud Ouest, Gironde — Rive droite, 5 February 2010. © Sud Ouest, all rights reserved. Transcribed from the paper facsimile; the original multi-column layout has been linearised.