"Medusa's Head" (Das Medusenhaupt, 1922), by Sigmund Freud, is a very short, posthumously published essay on the subject of the Medusa Myth.
Equating decapitation with castration, Freud maintained that the terror of Medusa was a reflection of the castration complex aroused in the young boy when the sight of the female genitals brought home the truth that females have no penis. [1]
The hair upon Medusa's head is frequently represented in works of art in the form of snakes. Freud considered that, as penis symbols derived from the pubic hair, they serve to mitigate the horror of the complex, [2] as a form of overcompensation. [3]
This sight of Medusa's head makes the spectator stiff with terror, turns him to stone. Observe that we have here once again the same origin from the castration complex and the same transformation of effect. In the original situation, it offers consolation to the spectator: he is still in possession of a penis, and the stiffening reassures him of the fact. [4]
Medusa's head as a symbol of horror was classically worn upon her dress by the virgin goddess Athena. Freud considered that as a result, she became the unapproachable woman who repels all sexual desire by carrying (symbolically) the genitals of the mother. [5]
Freud argued further that, because displaying the genitals (male and female) can be an apotropaic act - one aimed at intimidating and driving off the spectator [6] - so too was the defensive use of Medusa's head in classical Greece. Representations of her head - the so-called Gorgoneion - were pervasive there, appearing on walls, gates, fortifications, armour, and personal amulets. [7]
The heroine of Possession: A Romance claims to be planning a paper "to do with Melusina and Medusa and Freud's idea that the Medusa-head was castration-fantasy, female sexuality, feared, not desired". [8]
A set of allusive references to the matters of Freud's essay also helps to organise a central concern with male consciousness and female sexuality in Iris Murdoch's 1961 novel A Severed Head .
Foot fetishism, also known as foot partialism or podophilia, is a pronounced sexual interest in feet. It is the most common form of sexual fetishism for otherwise non-sexual objects or body parts.
Castration anxiety is an overwhelming fear of damage to, or loss of, the penis—a derivative of Sigmund Freud's theory of the castration complex, one of his earliest psychoanalytic theories. The term refers to the fear of emasculation in both a literal and metaphorical sense.
The genital stage in psychoanalysis is the term used by Sigmund Freud to describe the final stage of human psychosexual development. The individual develops a strong sexual interest in people outside of the family.
In psychology and psychiatry, scopophilia or scoptophilia is an aesthetic pleasure drawn from looking at an object or a person. In human sexuality, the term scoptophilia describes the sexual pleasure that a person derives from looking at prurient objects of eroticism, such as pornography, the nude body, and fetishes, as a substitute for actual participation in a sexual relationship.
The castration complex is a concept developed by Sigmund Freud, first presented in 1908, initially as part of his theorisation of the transition in early childhood development from the polymorphous perversity of infantile sexuality to the ‘infantile genital organisation’ which forms the basis for adult sexuality. The trauma induced by the child’s discovery of anatomical difference between the sexes gives rise to the fantasy of female emasculation or castration.
In psychoanalysis, psychosexual development is a central element of the sexual drive theory. According to Freud, personality develops through a series of childhood stages in which pleasure seeking energies from the child become focused on certain erogenous areas. An erogenous zone is characterized as an area of the body that is particularly sensitive to stimulation. The five psychosexual stages are the oral, the anal, the phallic, the latent, and the genital. The erogenous zone associated with each stage serves as a source of pleasure. Being unsatisfied at any particular stage can result in fixation. On the other hand, being satisfied can result in a healthy personality. Sigmund Freud proposed that if the child experienced frustration at any of the psychosexual developmental stages, they would experience anxiety that would persist into adulthood as a neurosis, a functional mental disorder.
Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality, sometimes titled Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex, is a 1905 work by Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, in which the author advances his theory of sexuality, in particular its relation to childhood.
Anal eroticism, in psychoanalysis, is sensuous pleasure derived from anal sensations. Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, hypothesized that the anal stage of childhood psychosexual development was marked by the predominance of anal eroticism.
Don Juanism or Don Juan syndrome is a non-clinical term for the desire, in a man, to have sex with many different female partners. The name derives from the Don Juan of opera and fiction. The term satyriasis is sometimes used as a synonym for Don Juanism. The term has also been referred to as the male equivalent of nymphomania in women. These terms no longer apply with any accuracy as psychological or legal categories of psychological disorder.
Otto Fenichel was a psychoanalyst of the so-called "second generation".
Alloplastic adaptation is a form of adaptation where the subject attempts to change the environment when faced with a difficult situation. Criminality, mental illness, and activism can all be classified as categories of alloplastic adaptation.
In psychoanalysis, decathexis is the withdrawal of cathexis from an idea or instinctual object.
In classical psychoanalytic theory, the Oedipus complex refers to a son's sexual attitude towards his mother and concomitant hostility toward his father, first formed during the phallic stage of psychosexual development. A daughter's attitude of desire for her father and hostility toward her mother is referred to as the feminine Oedipus complex. The general concept was considered by Sigmund Freud in The Interpretation of Dreams (1899), although the term itself was introduced in his paper A Special Type of Choice of Object made by Men (1910).
Penis envy is a stage in Sigmund Freud's theory of female psychosexual development, in which young girls experience anxiety upon realization that they do not have a penis. Freud considered this realization a defining moment in a series of transitions toward a mature female sexuality. In Freudian theory, the penis envy stage begins the transition from attachment to the mother to competition with the mother for the attention and affection of the father. The young boy's realization that women do not have a penis is thought to result in castration anxiety.
Hanns Sachs was one of the earliest psychoanalysts, and a close personal friend of Sigmund Freud. He became a member of Freud's Secret Committee of six in 1912, Freud describing him as one "in whom my confidence is unlimited in spite of the shortness of our acquaintance".
Narcissistic neurosis is a term introduced by Sigmund Freud to distinguish the class of neuroses characterised by their lack of object relations and their fixation upon the early stage of libidinal narcissism. The term is less current in contemporary psychoanalysis, but still a focus for analytic controversy.
Phallic monism is a term introduced by Chasseguet-Smirgel to refer to the theory that in both sexes the male organ—i.e. the question of possessing the penis or not—was the key to psychosexual development.
This is a list of writings published by Sigmund Freud. Books are either linked or in italics.
Some Character-Types Met within Psycho-Analytic Work is an essay by Sigmund Freud from 1916, comprising three character studies—of what he called 'The Exceptions', 'Those Wrecked by Success' and 'Criminals from a Sense of Guilt'.
In psychoanalysis, phallic woman is a concept to describe a woman with the symbolic attributes of the phallus. More generally, it describes any woman possessing traditionally masculine characteristics.