This essay is based on the premise of psychoanalytical literal theory through a perspective of the author-imprint, or the mirroring neural-effect of the author as an external persona - a force influencing, constructing and enforcing traits, intertextual messages and sublime meanings of the subconscious in the primary text material – the short story Imp of the Perverse, published by Edgar Allan Poe in 1845. The aim is to view this short story in light of Poe's empirically documented destructive personality, proposing that the message of the story, in itself, is more than simply a tale, but part of a larger contextual idea sprung from the pained soul of the author. As primary source for the hypothesis statement, theories by Freud and the later constructions on psychoanalysis as a tool for interpreting literature have been used, such as the collected works of Kurzweil & Phillips (Literature and Psychoanalysis). Further reference will be made to extensive autobiographical works on Poe himself, combined with specific research within the psychoanalytical field by authors such as Dr. Liebig (Criminal Insanity and Hypersensibility in Edgar Allan Poe), M. Bonaparte (The Life and Works of E.A. Poe, a psycho-analytic interpretation) and more. The results of this paper found that the dysfunctional lifestyle and neurotic tendencies of Edgar Allan Poe strongly indicate a connection between his psychological state, his experiences and the message of The Imp of the Perverse. The claim, then, is that Edgar Allan Poe did indeed fuel his short story with direct elements of his own psyche and moral values.

There are very few works not associated with the Western canon to have received as much attention as Chinua Achebe’s novel Things Fall Apart (Ogbaa 1). However, contrary to the many post-colonial interpretations of this novel, this essay employs a psychoanalytical literary approach to discuss the cause of the protagonist’s eventual demise, based on the premise that human behaviour is driven by an unconscious process. Consequently, this essay argues that following the ego’s inability to repress the infantile demands of the unconscious, the preconscious and the conscious self, ever more compulsive, repetitive and neurotic behaviours are displayed. Furthermore, this essay argues that Okonkwo’s relationship to his mother plays a significant role in explaining the tense relationship with his own father and sons. Subsequently, the protagonist’s self-confidence turns to pride and his masculinity develops into totalitarian rule leading to uncontrollable rage, Okonkwo’s world literally falls apart.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Uppsala University, 1989. / In English. Includes bibliographical references (p. 582-592).

This work examines the use of psychoanalytic terms and concepts in postcolonial theory, with attention to the social and historical contexts in which those terms and models originated. The thesis provides an overview of the different academic and political contexts out of which postcolonial theory evolved, focusing on how identity came to be a central term within postcolonial debates. Drawing on the work of scholars such as Anne McClintock, it critiques the current use of psychoanalytic models by postcolonial theorists, arguing that psychoanalysis is itself implicated in the history of European imperialism and brings with it concomitant assumptions about the nature of race, class, gender, and sexuality. The thesis provides an overview of the work of Charcot, Freud and Lacan. It takes up some of their major contributions to psychoanalysis, and discusses the social and political contexts in which those works were developed. The thesis goes on to provide a detailed analysis of the intersection of postcolonial theory and psychoanalysis in the work of Frantz Fanon, Edward Said, Homi Bhabha and Helene Cixous. The thesis concludes by discussing what I view as the two major ethical and intellectual problems that arise from the use of psychoanalysis in postcolonial theory. I argue, first, that psychoanalysis developed within the same cultural and political context as European colonialism. In spite of its moments of self-consciousness, psychoanalysis, nonetheless, reproduces some of the models of identity that supported European imperialism, both in Europe and abroad. Secondly, I argue that psychoanalysis takes, at root, a pessimistic view of human nature and this pessimism is fundamentally at odds with the emancipatory motives of postcolonial theory.

An overarching goal of my dissertation is to delineate social systemic processes as first and foremost embodied, experiential processes. I argue that such processes manifest through and depend upon the organism’s affective integration with her environment. Whereby, I delineate concepts like alienation and agency as manifesting through an affective intelligibility. Symbolic alienation, then, represents a circumstance in which institutional narratives purport moral or aesthetic truths that denigrate and deny the organism’s affective understanding of a circumstance. Agentic growth refers to the organism’s affective adaptation to an environment. Such growth follows from the process of working through experiential discordance (i.e., the disturbance of experiential flow or continuity) and manifests as a new-found sense of trust and understanding. Experiential discordance is an unavoidable occurrence because the organism-environment relationship is a dynamic one. If the organism is unable to mitigate and repair such discordance, she will face the threat of traumatization. Furthermore, those who disrupt the conventional-institutional organization or channeling of experience take on the character of dirt and thereby represent a dirty Other. If institutions react to the troubling, dirty Other by means of systemic repression, rather than genuine communication and reintegration, then said dirty Other takes on the character of shit. In such a circumstance, the presence of the dirty Other likely reveals deep, social systemic inadequacies and thereby ruptures the collective’s existential confidence and praxeological competence.

Diss. (sammanfattning) Stockholm : Karolinska institutet, 2005. / Härtill 4 uppsatser.

Thesis--Brandeis University. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 461-466).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Duquesne University, 2009. / Title from document title page. Abstract included in electronic submission form. Includes bibliographical references (p. 239-251) and index.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Duquesne University, 2006. / Title from document title page. Abstract included in electronic submission form. Includes bibliographical references (p. 156-170) and index.

Este trabalho de dissertação de mestrado se desenvolve em torno da pergunta sobre o sujeito na clínica psicanalítica das psicoses e trata de indagar sobre a estrutura em que o sujeito está simbolicamente representado, e na qual, ao mesmo tempo, ele faz parte. Indica-se o termo sujet para apontar a direção de Lacan de seu uso, fazendo um apanhado sobre os conceitos de sujeito e psicose na tentativa de desenvolver especificidades da relação entre os mesmos. Nota-se que a inferência clínica de não haver sujeito na estrutura das psicoses está sustentada sobre dois eixos principais que estão apontados neste trabalho: a relação dialética sujeito-objeto e o próprio conceito de estrutura. Neste sentido, faz-se uma crítica a estes dois eixos por não concernirem necessariamente à psicanálise. Utilizamos a banda de Moebius como estrutura topológica em homologia com o conceito de sujeito. Somente depois de se percorrer a banda de Moebius é que se revela que esta é de uma superfície unilátera. Assim também a posição de sujeito é efeito de um percurso no tempo e no espaço. Na escuta psicanalítica trata-se de ler um percurso discursivo (tempo) em um endereçamento ao lugar do Outro (espaço). Esta pesquisa mostra que sujeito é uma posição discursiva, efeito da relação entre a fala e a linguagem. Desta forma, podemos pensar o conceito de inconsciente e suas formações para todo o sujeito falante, indo além das restrições que o conceito de estrutura impõe à emergência do sujeito. Ao final, apresenta-se a hipótese da exclusão do sujeito do campo do Outro, como lugar de reconhecimento do sujeito, o que provoca efeitos tanto no âmbito subjetivo como nas práticas de cuidado que orientam as ciências atuais, como a psiquiatria, a psicologia e a psicanálise. / This work of master thesis is developed around the question about the subject in the psychoanalytical clinic of psychoses and inquires about the structure in which the subject is symbolically represented and in which, at the same time, it is a part of. It’s indicated the term sujet to point Lacan’s direction on its use, making a summary on the concepts of subject and psychosis in attempt to develop specificities of their relation. It is noticed that the clinic inference that there’s no subject in psychosis is sustained over two principal axes that are pointed in this work: the dialectical relation subject-object and the proper concept of structure. In this sense, it is present a critique to these two axes for doesn’t necessarily concern to psychoanalysis. We use the Moebius band as the topological structure in homology with the concept of subject. Only after covering the Moebius band is revealed that it is a one face surface. Through that also the position of subject is an effect of a travel on time and space. At the psychoanalytical listening it’s intended to read a discursive travel (time) in a adressement to the place of the Other (space). This research present that the subject is a discursive position, effect of the relationship between the speech and the language. At this form we can think the concept of unconscious and their formation to every specking subject, going over the restrictions that the concept of structure impose to the emergence of the subject. At the end, it’s presented the hypothesis of the exclusion of the subject from the field of the Other as the place of the recognition for the subject, what causes effects on both subjective sphere as in the care practices that guide the current science, like psychiatry, psychology and psychoanalysis.