Psychoanalysis & Sigmund Freud

Psychoanalysis is an attempt to understand the ways in which we are unconsciously/subconsciously motivated to act in a certain way- it’s aims to discover why humans do what they do and what is lurking deep within the unconscious human mind.

Why is Psychoanalysis significant?

• This concept was originally developed by Sigmund Freud, however, many academics apply it today through the work of Jacques Lacan.
• According to Lancian’s model, the self is created by differentiating itself from the surround world. This was also called the ‘mirror stage’ by Lacan, as it is through the reflected image that the infant first starts to see themselves different to their surroundings.
• Film and media provide mirrors that help individuals to understand who they are and what their place in the world is.

For those who apply a Lacanian approach (or other psychoanalytic approaches), the viewer is seen as attempting to discover who they are through the text. This is one of the reasons why feminist film theory often draws upon psychoanalysis; the text shapes who we are along with how we see ourselves and others.

Freud:

Freud was the original founder of psychoanalysis and others have built upon his work and theories. He believed that dreams had meanings and that they could be interpreted; meaning they revealed something important about what was going on in our brain.

He stated that we were driven by a “pleasure principle”- we become well-adjusted adults. However, if it is repressed too much, we develop neuroses.

Freud came up with the idea that our minds have 3 parts which are constant conflict:

• ID (driven by the ‘pleasure principle’). This is our animalistic self who just wants easy gratification
• The Ego
• The Superego (driven by a need to follow the rules). This is our supreme self – rational, logical and intelligent

The Virgin Whore Dichotomy

Freud stated that men were unable to find a woman sexually attractive when they demonstrated traits associated with being good. However, they were unable to trust women who demonstrated traits associated with being bad. This theory was based upon Freud’s 1916 theory, ‘The Madonna/Whore Complex.

This put men in a position of anxiety and therefore meant women were forced dto adopt either the Madonna or the Whore persona but not both.

• “Where such men love they have no desire and where they desire they cannot love” (Sigmund Freud, 1916)
• The virgin/whore dichotomy has built this original theory to extended to popular culture studies and analysis. Females in popular culture are often seen as having to adopt either the virgin or the whore persona in order to be successful and are unable to have both personalities simultaneously. But often society rewards the virgin and punishes the whore. Women learn that, in order to succeed, they need to be pure and chaste (containing female sexuality and independence).

 The Oedipal/ Oedipus Complex

• This theory states that we prefer one parent over the other- this is based upon the Greek tragedy of Oedipus who accidently killed his father and marries his mother without knowing at the time, they are his parents.
• It largely concerns male children who are completely dependent on their mother – the mother is the child’s entire world. She feeds the child, protects them and nurtures them.

However, the infant fears that the father might come between him and the mother and so wants him gone. The baby wants to remove the threat posed by the father in order to be solely with the mother.

Furthermore, the infant becomes aware that, later in life, he will have a companion much like their mother. This sexual confusion creates anxiety and panic in the child which they take with them for the rest of their lives. Sometimes, the female child is the one who resents the mother because of the relationship they have with the father.

Carl Jung called this Electra Complex for females, but Sigmund Freud called it Oedipal Complex for both. The theory has been developed to suggest that men get ‘womb envy’ and women get ‘penis envy’.

These issues are often in films, not literally but symbolically. For example, the male character might become obsessive of female characters who represent a matriarchal figure, or they resent other male characters who represent patriarchal figures. For females, it is portrayed as a female character becoming obsessive over a patriarchal male character and resenting matriarchal female characters (The Oedipal/Oedipus Complex).