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Seminar in Contemporary Critical TheoryProf. Dr. Petruta Naidut

Maria-Cristina Stanciu1-st Year, English MajorGroup 5

19-th March 2009

PSYCHOANALYTICAL APPROACHES SIGMUND FREUD

(1856-1939)

About Sigmund Freud

He was an Austrian psychiatrist who founded the psychoanalytic school of psychology. Freud isbest known for his theories of the unconscious mind and the defense mechanism of repression and forcreating the clinical practice of psychoanalysis for curing psychopathology through dialogue between apatient and a psychoanalyst. Freud is also renowned for his redefinition of sexual desire as the primarymotivational energy of human life, as well as his therapeutic techniques, including the use of freeassociation, his theory of transference in the therapeutic relationship, and the interpretation of dreams assources of insight into unconscious desires. He was also an early neurological researcher into cerebralpalsy. Freud's methods and ideas remain important in clinical psychodynamic approaches. In academiahis ideas continue to influence the humanities and some social sciences.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_Freud)

From On Dreams- 1901 (The Essentials of Psycho-Analysis)

In this article, S. Freud identifies and characterizes two processes of the dream-work:

1. the CONDENSATION, meaning that each element in the content of a dream is overdetermined bymaterial in the dream-thoughts,

or

2. the DREAM-DISPLACEMENT, meaning a transvaluation of psychical values

or

CONDENSATION + DREAM-DISPLACEMENT PRIMARY REVISION (because these processesoccur while we dream)

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_Freudhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_Freud

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From Beyond the Pleasure Principle -1920 (The Essentials of Psycho-Analysis)

MAIN IDEAS:

the mind has a strong tendency towards the pleasure principle

under the influence of the egos instincts of self-preservation, the pleasure principle is replaced bythe reality principle, which carries into effect the postponement of satisfaction, the abandonment of anumber of possibilities of gaining satisfaction

the pleasure principle long persists as a matter of working employed by the sexual instincts,which are hard to educate

the life instincts have much more contact with our internal perception- emerging as breakers ofthe peace and constantly producing tensions whose release is felt as pleasure.

From The Ego and the Id -1923 (The Essentials of Psycho-Analysis)

The OEDIPUS COMPLEX: for a boy ~ at a very early age the little boy develops an object-cathexis for his mother (the origin the mothers breast which used to nurture him; it is a prototype of anobject-choice on the anaclitic model)

~ the boy deals with his father by identifying himselfwith him

~ when the boys sexual wishes in regard to his motherbecome more intense, he perceives his father as an obstacle to them

~ his identification with the father changes into a wishto get rid of his father in order to take his place with his mother the relation with his father is

ambivalent: first he identifies himself with him, then he wants him out of the presence of his mother~ when the complex does no longer exist, the boysobject-cathexis is filled by one or two things: either with an identification with his mother or anintensification of his identification with his father

for a girl ~ the same steps, but this time the object-cathexis isdeveloped for her father and the mother is the one which is perceived as an obstacle

~ the outcome of the Oedipus complex in a little girl maybe an intensification of her identification with her mother this will fix the childs feminine character;

or~ will bring her masculinity into prominence and identify herself

with her father, the love-object that she lost.

From The Dissection of the Psychical Personality ( The Essentials of Psycho-Analysis)

An individuals mental apparatus is divided in three realms, regions:

the CONSCIENCE / SUPER-EGO = the agency in the ego that implies three psychologicalphenomena: observing, judging and punishing (distressing reproaches remorse)

characteristics:~ enjoys a certain degree of autonomy~ follows its own intentions~ is independent of the ego for its supply of energy

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~ severe, cruel are applied in the melancholic attacks (periodicphenomena), when the super-ego abuses the ego by reproaching it past actions.

the EGO characteristics: ~it observes the external world and lays down an accurate picture of it inthe memory-traces of its perceptions

~controls the approaches to motility under the ids orders

~it is weak, it has borrowed its energies from the id~carries out the ids intentions, it fulfills its task by finding out the

circumstances in which these intentions can best be achieved~has to satisfy his three masters simultaneously (the external world, the

super-ego, and the id); but when it is threatened by three kinds of danger, and feels hard pressed, it reactsby generating anxiety.

the UNCONSCIOUS / ID - characteristics: ~it is the dark, inaccessible part of our personality~ it is opposed to the Ego

~it is approached with analogies: it is called chaos, acauldron full of seething excitations

~ it is filled with energy reaching it from the instincts~ it has no organization~produces no collective will

~it strives to bring about the satisfaction of the instinctualneeds

~ does not apply logical laws of thought~it does not recognize the passage of time (the impulses

behave as though they had just occurred).

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