| Part of a series of articles on |
| Psychoanalysis |
|---|
 |
In Jungian psychology, the Wise Old Woman and the Wise Old Man are archetypes of the collective unconscious.
The Wise Old Woman, or helpful old woman, "is a well-known symbol in myths and fairy tales for the wisdom of the eternal female nature." [1] The Wise Old Man, "or some other very powerful aspect of eternal masculinity" is her male counterpart. [2]
In Carl Jung's thought, the individuation process was marked by a sequence of archetypes, each acquiring predominance at successive stages, and so reflecting what he termed an ascending psychic scale or "hierarchy of the unconscious". [3] : 226 Thus, beginning with the intermediate position of "anima or animus...just as the latter have a higher position in the hierarchy than the shadow, so wholeness lays claim to a position and a value superior," [4] still. The Wise Old Woman and Man, as what he termed Mana or supraordinate personalities, stood for that wholeness of the self: "the mother ("Primordial Mother" and "Earth Mother") as a supraordinary personality...as the 'self'." [5]
As Marie-Louise von Franz put it: [6]
If an individual has wrestled seriously and long enough with the anima (or animus) problem, so that he, or she, is no longer partially identified with it, the unconscious again changes its dominant character and appears in a new symbolic form representing the Self, the innermost nucleus of the personality. In the dreams of a woman this centre is usually personified as a superior female figure – a priestess, sorceress, earth mother, or goddess of nature or love. In the case of a man, it manifests itself as a masculine initiator and guardian (an Indian guru ), a wise old man, a spirit of nature and so forth.
The masculine initiator was described by Jung as "a figure of the same sex corresponding to the father-imago...the mana-personality [a]s a dominant of the collective unconscious, the recognized archetype of the mighty man in the form of hero, chief, magician, medicine-man, saint, the ruler of men and spirits." [3] : 226–7 Similarly, "the wise Old Woman figure represented by Hecate or the Crone...the Great Mother" [7] stood for an aspect of the mother-imago. The archetypes of the collective unconscious can thus be seen as inner representations of the same-sex parent—as an "imago built up from parental influences plus the specific reactions of the child." [3] : 184–5 Consequently, for the Jungian, "the making conscious of those contents which constitute the archetype of the mana personality signifies therefore "for the man the second and true liberation from the father, for the woman that from the mother, and therewith the first perception of their own unique individuality'." [8]
In Jung's view, "all archetypes spontaneously develop favourable and unfavourable, light and dark, good and bad effects." [9] : 267 Thus "the 'good Wise Man' must here be contrasted with a correspondingly dark, chthonic figure," [9] : 229 and in the same way, the priestess or sibyl has her counterpart in the figure of "the witch...called by Jung the 'terrible mother'." [10] Taken together, male and female, "The hunter or old magician and the witch correspond to the negative parental images in the magic world of the unconscious." [11] : 235
However, judgement of such collective archetypes must not be hasty: "Just as all archetypes have a positive, favourable, bright side that points upwards, so also they have one that points downwards, partly negative and unfavourable, partly chthonic"—so that, for example, "the sky-woman is the positive, the bear the negative aspect of the 'supraordinate personality', which extends the conscious human being upwards into the celestial and downwards into the animal regions." [11] : 195, 226 Yet both aspects, celestial and chthonic, were of equal value for Jung, as he sought for what he termed a coniunctio oppositorum, a union of opposites. "One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light," he argued, "but by making the darkness conscious." [12] Similarly, with respect to the goal of the individuation process itself, "as a totality, the self is a coincidentia oppositorum; it is therefore bright and dark and yet neither." [13] At this stage of development one possesses discernment or some other virtue.
Coming to terms with the Mana figures of the collective unconscious—with the parental imagos—thus meant overcoming a psychic splitting, so as to make possible an acceptance of "the Twisted side of the Great Mother"; an acceptance of the way "the father contains both Kings at once...the Twisted King and the Whole King." [14]
Carl Gustav Jung was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. He was a prolific author, illustrator, and correspondent, and a complex and controversial character, presumably best known through his "autobiography" Memories, Dreams, Reflections.
The concept of an archetype appears in areas relating to behavior, historical psychology, and literary analysis.
Collective unconscious refers to the unconscious mind and shared mental concepts. It is generally associated with idealism and was coined by Carl Jung. According to Jung, the human collective unconscious is populated by instincts, as well as by archetypes: ancient primal symbols such as The Great Mother, the Wise Old Man, the Shadow, the Tower, Water, and the Tree of Life. Jung considered the collective unconscious to underpin and surround the unconscious mind, distinguishing it from the personal unconscious of Freudian psychoanalysis. He believed that the concept of the collective unconscious helps to explain why similar themes occur in mythologies around the world. He argued that the collective unconscious had a profound influence on the lives of individuals, who lived out its symbols and clothed them in meaning through their experiences. The psychotherapeutic practice of analytical psychology revolves around examining the patient's relationship to the collective unconscious.
The principle of individuation, or principium individuationis, describes the manner in which a thing is identified as distinct from other things.
Analytical psychology is a term coined by Carl Jung, a Swiss psychiatrist, to describe research into his new "empirical science" of the psyche. It was designed to distinguish it from Freud's psychoanalytic theories as their seven-year collaboration on psychoanalysis was drawing to an end between 1912 and 1913. The evolution of his science is contained in his monumental opus, the Collected Works, written over sixty years of his lifetime.
The wise old man is an archetype as described by Carl Jung, as well as a classic literary figure, and may be seen as a stock character. The wise old man can be a profound philosopher distinguished for wisdom and sound judgment.
In analytical psychology, the shadow is an unconscious aspect of the personality that does not correspond with the ego ideal, leading the ego to resist and project the shadow, leading to a conflict with it. In short, the shadow is the self's emotional blind spot - the part the ego does not want to acknowledge - projected as archetypes—or, in a metaphorical sense-image complexes, personified within the collective unconscious; e.g., trickster.
The anima and animus are a syzygy of dualistic, Jungian archetypes among the array of other animistic parts within the Self in Jungian psychology, described in analytical psychology and archetypal psychology, under the umbrella of transpersonal psychology. The Jungian parts of the Self are a priori part of the infinite set of archetypes within the collective unconscious. Modern Jungian clinical theory under the analytical/archetypal-psych framework considers a syzygy-without-its-partner to be like yin without yang: countertransference reveals that logos and/or eros are in need of repair through a psychopomp, mediating the identified patient's Self; this theoretical model is similar to positive psychology's understanding of a well-tuned personality through something like a Goldilocks principle.
The child archetype is a Jungian archetype, first suggested by psychologist Carl Jung. In more recent years, author Caroline Myss has suggested that the child, out of the four survival archetypes, is present in all humans. According to Myss, its presence ranges from "childish to childlike longing for the innocent, regardless of age" and comprises sub-archetypes: "wounded child", "abandoned or orphan child", "dependent child", "magical/innocent child", "nature child", "divine child", and "eternal child".
The Self in Jungian psychology is a dynamic concept which has undergone numerous modifications since it was first conceptualised as one of the Jungian archetypes.
Two Essays on Analytical Psychology is volume 7 of The Collected Works of C. G. Jung, presenting the core of Carl Jung's views about psychology. Known as one of the best introductions to Jung's work, the volumes includes the essays "The Relations between the Ego and the Unconscious" and "On the Psychology of the Unconscious" (1943).
Psychology and Alchemy, volume 12 in The Collected Works of C. G. Jung, is Carl Jung's study of the analogies between alchemy, Christian dogma, and psychological symbolism.
The Collected Worksof C. G. Jung is a book series containing the first collected edition, in English translation, of the major writings of Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung.
Jungian archetypes are a concept from psychology that refers to a universal, inherited idea, pattern of thought, or image that is present in the collective unconscious of all human beings. The psychic counterpart of instinct, archetypes are thought to be the basis of many of the common themes and symbols that appear in stories, myths, and dreams across different cultures and societies. Some examples of archetypes include those of the mother, the child, the trickster, and the flood, among others. The concept of the collective unconscious was first proposed by Carl Jung, a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst.
The Apollo archetype personifies the aspect of the personality that wants clear definitions, is drawn to master a skill, values order and harmony. The Apollo archetype favors thinking over feeling, distance over closeness, objective assessment over subjective intuition.
This is a list of writings published by Carl Jung. Many of Jung's most important works have been collected, translated, and published in a 20-volume set by Princeton University Press, entitled The Collected Works of C. G. Jung. Works here are arranged by original publication date if known.
Archetypal pedagogy is a theory of education developed by Clifford Mayes that aims at enhancing psycho-spiritual growth in both the teacher and student. The idea of archetypal pedagogy stems from the Jungian tradition and is directly related to analytical psychology.
Jolande Jacobi was a Swiss psychologist, best remembered for her work with Carl Jung, and for her writings on Jungian psychology.
The persona, for Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, is the social face the individual presented to the world—"a kind of mask, designed on the one hand to make a definite impression upon others, and on the other to conceal the true nature of the individual."
Scholars, including psychoanalysts, have commented that J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth stories about both Bilbo Baggins, protagonist of The Hobbit, and Frodo Baggins, protagonist of The Lord of the Rings, constitute psychological journeys. Bilbo returns from his journey to help recover the Dwarves' treasure from Smaug the dragon's lair in the Lonely Mountain changed, but wiser and more experienced. Frodo returns from his journey to destroy the One Ring in the fires of Mount Doom scarred by multiple weapons, and is unable to settle back into the normal life of his home, the Shire.
| Theories | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Concepts |
| ||||||||
| Publications |
| ||||||||
| People |
| ||||||||
| Houses | |||||||||
| Organizations | |||||||||
| Popular culture | |||||||||
| Other | |||||||||
