Questions for discussion and revision

one Where it was: Freud's biology of the mind

  1. What are the systems posited by Freud in Project for a Scientific Psychology, and what are their functions?
  2. What is the “pleasure principle”? And what is its relation to the “reality principle”?
  3. Outline the differences between perception, memory and motility, according to Freud.
  4. What is the “libido”?
  5. What is/are the chief function(s) and characteristic(s) of the ego for Freud?
  6. Can repression deal successfully with inappropriate wishes? If so, then how? If not, then why not?
  7. What is the “id”? What is its relation to the ego?
  8. What is the superego in relation to the ego and the id?
  9. What defines “mental health” for Freud? Describe in these terms the conditions that lead to mental ill health.
  10. What are the varieties of mental illness, according to Freud? What are the characteristics of each type?

two Sexuality and its vicissitudes

  1. Do you find Freud’s emphasis upon sexuality as the root of behaviour and culture plausible? Why/why not?
  2. What are the grounds Freud provides for accepting his sexuality hypothesis?
  3. Describe Freud’s account, and dichotomy, of “perversion”. What is the place of the perversions in Freud’s greater theory of sexuality?
  4. Do you agree with Freud that mental illness and the development of sexuality in the individual are connected?
  5. What are the four characteristics of the drive, as described by Freud in “Drives and Their Vicissitudes”?
  6. What are the “vicissitudes” of the drive?
  7. Freud understands activities like thumb-sucking to be autoerotic and sexual. Why? Are you convinced by his explanation?
  8. What differentiates human sexuality from sex between other animals, for Freud?
  9. What are the principal features of the Oedipus complex, according to Freud? What do you think about this theory?
  10. What is Freud’s explanation for why some men desire only women whom they cannot love?

three To slip, perchance to dream: Freud on the unconscious

  1. Do you think there is a fundamental tension between Freud’s biological and linguistic (topographical) accounts of the unconscious? Or are these accounts complementary? Discuss.
  2. Describe the two functions of the psyche’s mnemic apparatus.
  3. Explain the difference between the systems preconscious and unconscious, and how these two systems interact with one another (use examples).
  4. What is the basis of all dreams, according to Freud? Do you agree, and why/why not?
  5. Why do nightmares appear to contradict Freud’s account of dreams? And how does Freud explain this (apparent) discrepancy? Do you find this explanation convincing?
  6. What is the difference between the “latent” and “manifest” contents of dreams? How do the latent and manifest contents interact in the weaving together of a dream?
  7. Freud refers to dreams as “picture puzzles” or “rebuses”. What is meant by this analogy?
  8. What is the purpose of “secondary revision” of dreams?
  9. What is the difference between the latent contents of the dream and the “dream wish”? Do you find the concept of the dream wish compelling?
  10. Explain the mechanisms of condensation and displacement.

four Precarious love: Kleinian object relations theory

  1. What are the main principles of Klein’s “play technique”? Do you think her adaptation of psychoanalysis for children is continuous with Freudian clinical practice?
  2. Enumerate the key differences between the “schizoid” and “depressive” positions. Do you agree with the object relations theorists’ contention that everyone must pass through both of these positions to become a mature, balanced individual?
  3. According to Klein, schizophrenia represents a regression to the schizoid position, and depression (melancholia) to the depressive position. Do you agree with this way of framing mental illness?
  4. What are the key disagreements between Klein and other Freudians respecting the Oedipus complex? Are you more sympathetic with Klein, or her opponents, in this regard?
  5. Do you think that Klein’s depiction of the child’s fantasy life is credible? What do you make of the “good” and “bad” breast?
  6. What is the “good-enough” mother?
  7. What is the function of “transitional objects”? Do you think that Winnicott’s theory has merit?
  8. What does Wilfred Bion mean by “containment”?
  9. Describe Bion’s theory of communication, and relate it to Klein’s understanding of “good” and “bad” objects.
  10. What are Fairbairn’s objections to Freud? Do you agree? Why/why not?

five Jacques Lacan: rereading Freud to the letter

  1. How, and why, does Lacan position himself as a “return” to Freud?
  2. What is meant by Lacan’s phrase “the unconscious is structured like a language”? Discuss.
  3. What does Lacan’s refrain that desire is always “desire of the other” tell us about his concept of the subject?
  4. What is the significance for the psyche of human children’s prolonged dependence upon adults, according to Lacan?
  5. How does Lacan reinterpret the Oedipus complex? What do you think is the import of this reinterpretation?
  6. What is the difference between the “real”, the “imaginary” and the “symbolic” fathers? What is the significance of this difference?
  7. What does Lacan mean by saying that “the Father is always a dead father”?
  8. What is the objet petit a? And what is its relation to fantasy?
  9. Lacan employs the insights of linguistic structuralism to Freudian psychoanalysis. What are the important features he utilizes, and how does he do so?
  10. What does a “master signifier” do?

six What does woman want? Feminism and psychoanalysis

  1. Explain how psychoanalysis might provide useful tools for feminist research.
  2. Do you think that, on balance, Helene Deutsch’s psychoanalytic theories about women are productive for feminism? Why/why not?
  3. Evaluate Karen Horney’s equation of the little boy’s perspective and that of the psychoanalyst. Do you think she is correct, and what would the significance of this equivalence be, if she were?
  4. Do you think Karen Horney’s analysis of penis-envy as just one kind of envy has merit? And what of her analysis of men’s envy of women’s reproductive capacity?
  5. The existentialist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir opposed psychoanalysis. Why?
  6. Why have feminists such as Kate Millett understood Freud to be an archsexist?
  7. How does Juliet Mitchell respond to feminists such as Millett regarding the sex/gender distinction? How does psychoanalysis figure in this response?
  8. What role is played by the Oedipus complex, according to Mitchell? And what is the family’s significance within capitalist society?
  9. Explain how Luce Irigaray represents her own relation to Freud. Is it an all-out rejection, or an appropriation of psychoanalytic theory?
  10. What are the key points of Sarah Kofman’s criticisms of Freudian psychoanalysis?

seven Freud as philosopher? Civilization, art and religion

  1. Briefly describe the key features of Freud’s account of civilization. Do you think it is a compelling account? Why/why not?
  2. What is the significance of the incest taboo for Freud’s understanding of society?
  3. Max Horkheimer is critical of the concept of the death drive. Why?
  4. Adorno and Horkheimer employ psychoanalysis to the task of comprehending the rise of fascism. What is their basic thesis?
  5. What is the relation of “play” and creativity, according to Freud?
  6. Recount what the “uncanny” means for Freud. What has the uncanny to do with works of art?
  7. What is the meaning of the “gaze” for Lacan?
  8. According to Lacan, what is “anamorphosis”, and what does it indicate about subjectivity?
  9. Distinguish Freud’s different currents of thought regarding religion. Do you agree with one more than others?
  10. Summarize the objections to Freud’s account of religion proffered by Pfister, Strauss and Ricoeur. What is your opinion regarding these different approaches to religion?

eight Where psychoanalysis has come to be: philosophy, science, society and ethics

  1. Briefly summarize the scientific grounds for criticism of Freudianism, according to Nagel and Popper. What are the chief differences between their respective objections?
  2. How does Paul Ricoeur respond to objections that psychoanalysis is not a science?
  3. What is “neuropsychoanalysis”? Do you think neuropsychoanalysis might achieve what Freud’s “Project for a Scientific Psychology” had promised?
  4. How is psychoanalysis like other sciences, and how is it unlike them? Do you think it is in psychoanalysis’s best interest to pursue its connection to the natural sciences? Or do you find the alignment with hermeneutics more convincing?
  5. The insights of poststructuralist theory can broadly be seen as both critical of, and as extending upon, psychoanalysis. How does each of the following negotiate their theoretical relation to Freud and Lacan: Derrida? Foucault? Deleuze and Guattari?
  6. Philip Rieff suggests that Freud “democratizes” the clinic, and that this has knock-on effects for society. Summarize his argument for this claim. Do you agree?
  7. Summarize Jürgen Habermas’s response to Popper.
  8. Summarize Adolf Grunbaum’s objections to psychoanalysis. Do you agree with these objections? Why/why not?
  9. How do Grunbaums’s objections tally with those of Nagel and Popper?
  10. What is the role of the transference for psychoanalytic practice? Do you think that the transference renders psychoanalysis’s status problematic? Or is the transference an important element to the enquiry into what it is to be human? Discuss.