Vanderbilt University

College Honors Seminar—HONS 183-37

Spring 2010

The Freudian Century

Professor Elizabeth Lunbeck

elizabeth.lunbeck@vanderbilt.edu
Benson Hall 234

T/R 2:35-3:50

An introduction to some major issues and concepts in psychoanalysis, considered

clinically in cultural and historical—and, where relevant, contemporary—context; the
consolidation and rise to prominence of a distinctively modern psychological perspective
on human nature, motivation, desire, and need.

Course materials:
Non-circulating sets of The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological
Works of Sigmund Freud (24 volumes), ed. by James Strachey in collaboration with Anna
Freud, assisted by Alix Strachey and Alan Tyson (1953-74) (abbreviated as SE below)
are to be found on reserve in the main library. Books are available for purchase in Rand,
and all course materials are available on OAK.

Course requirements:
Students may choose to either 1) write two 5-7 page papers, based on course
readings (due dates: Thursday, March 2 and Tuesday, April 27) or 2) write a 15-20
page paper, due Friday, April 30.
All students post seven 1-2 page response papers on Blackboard over the course
of the semester. Papers must be posted by 6pm Monday (for Tuesday class) and 6pm
Wednesday (for Thursday class).
Attendance is mandatory.

PROLOGUE

Introduction

Thursday, January 14

No assignment

1
What is psychoanalysis?

Tuesday, January 19

Freud, Five Lectures on Psychoanalysis (1909), SE 11, 9-39

Thursday, January 21

Freud, Five Lectures, 40-55

Freud, “Two Encyclopaedia Articles” (1923), SE 18, 235-39

Why psychoanalysis?

Tuesday, January 26

P. Rieff, The Triumph of the Therapeutic: Uses of Faith after Freud (1966), 1-47

Thursday, January 28

Rieff, Triumph of the Therapeutic, 48-78, 232-261

PART 1: THE ANALYTIC SETTING

Talk

Tuesday, February 2

J. Breuer, “Fräulein Anna O.,” Studies on Hysteria, SE 2 (1893-95): 21-47

Thursday, February 4

S. Freud, “The Dynamics of Transference” (1912), SE 12: 99-108

S. Freud, “Freud’s Psycho-Analytic Procedure” (1904), SE 7: 249-54
S. Ferenczi, “On the Technique of Psycho-analysis” (1919), in Further Contributions to
the Theory and Technique of Psycho-analysis, ed. J. Rickman (1950): 177-83

Technique

Tuesday, February 9

S. Freud, “Observations on Transference-Love” (1914), SE 12, 159-71

J. Forrester, “Contracting the Disease of Love: Authority and Freedom in the Origins of
Psychoanalysis,” in The Seductions of Psychoanalysis (1990): 30-47

2
Thursday, February 11

E. Engelman, Berggasse 19: Sigmund Freud’s Home and Offices, Vienna 1938 (1981)
D. Fuss, “Freud’s Ear,” in The Sense of an Interior (2004): 71-105

PART II: ANALYTIC CONCEPTS

Trauma

Tuesday, February 16

S. Freud, “The Aetiology of Hysteria” (1896), SE 3: 189-221

S. Freud to W. Fliess, 2 May and 21 Sept. 1897, in J. Masson, ed., The Complete Letters
of Sigmund Freud to Wilhelm Fliess (1985), 238-40, 264-67

Thursday, February 18

J. Herman, Trauma and Recovery (1992), 1-32, 115-129

Dream

Tuesday, February 16

S. Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams (1900), SE 4, 96-134

Thursday, February 18

S. Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams (1900), SE 4, 277-338

Tuesday, February 23

S. Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams (1900), SE 4, 193-198

C. Schorske, Fin-de-siècle Vienna (1979), 181-207

Sexuality

Thursday, February 25

S. Freud, Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905), 135-185

Tuesday, March 2

S. Freud, Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905), 185-243

3
Thursday, March 4

MOVIE--Secrets of a Soul (1926)

Spring break

Gender

Tuesday, March 16

S. Freud, “A Special Type of Object-Choice Made by Men” (1910), SE 11: 164-75

S. Freud, “The Infantile Genital Organization” (1923), SE 19: 140-45

Thursday, March 18

S. Freud, “Some Psychological Consequences of the Anatomical Distinction between the

Sexes” (1924), SE 19: 243-58
Freud, “Femininity” (1932), SE 22: 121-35

PART III: ANALTYIC TYPES

Hysteric

Tuesday, March 23

S. Freud, “Fragment of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria [Dora],” (1905 [1901]), SE 7:

3-122

Thursday, March 25

J. Gallop, “Keys to Dora,” in The Daughter’s Seduction (1982): 132-50

Woman

Tuesday, March 30

J. Riviere, “Womanliness as a Masquerade,” International Journal of Psychoanalysis 10

(1929): 303-13
A. Reich, “A Contribution to the Psychoanalysis of Extreme Submissiveness in Women,”
Psychoanalytic Quarterly 9 (1940): 470-80
A. Reich, “Narcissistic Object Choice in Women,” Journal of the American
Psychoanalytic Association 1 (1953): 22-44

4
Thursday, April 1

J. Butler, Gender Trouble (1990), 43-57

L. Kaplan, Female Perversions (1991), 201-236

Narcissist

Tuesday, April 6

S. Freud, “On Narcissism: An Introduction” (1914), SE 14: 69-102

Thursday, April 8

C. Lasch, The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing

Expectations (1979), 1-51

Tuesday, April 13

J. M. Twenge, Generation Me (2006)

PART IV: SELF AND SOCIETY

Therapeutic optimism

Thursday, April 15

J. Metzl, Prozac on the Couch (2003), 71-125

Tuesday, April 22

Andrea Tone, The Age of Anxiety (2009), 175-232

Analytic pessimism

Thursday, April 24

S. Freud, Civilization and its Discontents (1930), SE 21, 64-107

Tuesday, April 27

S. Freud, Civilization and its Discontents (1930), SE 21, 108-145