- The Good: A short, accessible series of essays that view anthropology through the lens of psychotherapy
- The Bad: Treatment of indigenous cultures is offensive and reductive; inherent limitation in psychotherapy
- The Literary: Highly researched, with references
Sigmund Freud turns psychoanalysis towards anthropology in this short collection of four essays, first published in 1913. The work was widely read across multiple disciplines, including by the educated American public, generating both high praise and harsh critiques.
Totem and Taboo is fascinating on multiple accounts, as a historical piece, a preview into Freud’s way of thinking and what it might have been like to lay on his famous couch, and an introduction to psychoanalysis. Before I go much further, I do have to preface that to modern eyes the terminology for and view of native peoples is extremely offensive. His perception of indigenous tribes as primitive in their thought processes or somehow closer to some human origin is ignorant. Although he is bound by his time and language and mental framework, Freud is not casual in his ideas, so I still enjoy this work.
In the first essay, “The Horror of Incest”, Freud argues that the origin of totemism — that is, clan structures that are represented by animals, plants, etc — were originally formed to prevent incest. Throughout all his essays, he primarily cites the work of Sir James George Frazer, a Scottish anthropologist. In this case, Freud focuses on the Australian Aboriginals but also mentions specific cultures in Africa and the Pacific Islands. In fact, the most enjoyable part of reading this essay is learning about Frazer’s observances of these tribes. Freud assumes early that taboos are social laws and social constructs, and that you only need laws if people have a tendency to break them, thereby concluding that all of us unconsciously want to have sex with our parents or children.
The second essay, “Taboo and Emotional Ambivalence,” Freud expands on the types of taboo, including customs related to the treatment of enemies during and after battle, chiefs and kings, as well as ceremonies around death. He also builds on the first essay to assert that, like some of his neurotic patients, primitive people have an emotional duality, conscious and unconscious feelings, but that those unconscious feelings are often projected elsewhere, and in this case, to the totem. For example, we fear the dead, not just their corpses but also their ghosts or spirits or totems, and Freud asserts that we do so because there is some part of our unconscious that wanted them to die, and we fear retribution.
At this point, halfway through the book, I realized I wasn’t particularly enjoying myself. Although the ideas presented are interesting, I find them overly simplistic, especially in the lumping together of all behaviors of indigenous cultures. I was also still settling in to Freud’s writing style and grappling internally with the many references to savages. But it is in the last two essays that the elements of psychoanalysis really shine.
In the third essay, “Animism, Magic and the Omnipotence of Thought” Freud further explores the emotional duality, or “ambivalence”, in which our internal mental unconscious life is projected into the external world. Most commonly in primitive minds, projections focus on animism, giving a spiritual essence to inanimate objects. Whereas in the modern world we retain some magic or paranormal superstitions, as well as an interest in art. This is especially true for specific patients of Freud who display obsessive thinking, delusional disorders, and phobias.
Here, I must give specific examples, because they are fascinating, and I also find the modern patient studies a more persuasive argument for Freud than his second-hand filtered observances of indigenous people. In all cases, Freud finds specific examples of little boys transferring their fear of their fathers onto animals. One boy, upon seeing a dog would weep and cry out, “Don’t bite me doggie; I’ll be good!” Upon further questioning, the boy admitted that by good, he meant he “wouldn’t play the fiddle” or masturbate. One boy was afraid of horses and thought that they would bite him, and he would die, which stemmed from his father leaving for extended periods of time. Even more sensationally, one boy tried to urinate in a chicken coop while visiting relatives on holiday, and a rooster snapped at his penis. For many subsequent years, the boy became fascinated with chickens and cocks, abandoning human speech for some time, singing songs about them, but also playing at slaughtering them and dancing around their bodies. He admitted, “my father’s the cock… when I’m bigger, I’ll be a cock.”
“The Return of Totemism in Childhood” is the theoretical climax of Freud’s arguments. Here, he juxtaposes Charles Darwin’s theory of early human societies in which a single alpha-male is surrounded by a harem of females, with the theory of the sacrifice ritual. Together, he concludes that a band of prehistoric brothers expelled from the alpha-male group, organized and returned to kill their alpha-male father, which formed the foundation of totemism and the Oedipus complex. From here, he postulates that all religions extend from that collective guilt in penance for the original sin of the murder of the father figure.
Freud is a highly rational and thoughtful man, and it’s clear in this short collection that he has great ability to stimulate the imagination. He is well-read and his essays are well-referenced. I think both Freud and his readers are drawn to the grandiose unifying theory he proposes, and he doesn’t shy away from the ambitious task of tracing the origins of human desire, morality, social organization, and religion.
Freud created a system of research founded upon the Oedipus complex, and he viewed the entire world through this lens. Unfortunately, it’s terribly limited and does little to explain anthropological questions about why totems are often specific animals or why so many indigenous societies are matriarchal. He generalizes and makes wilds leaps to his conclusions. But Freud also radically changed the face of how we understand human behavior by recognizing the importance of the unconscious.
Recommended as a short and accessible introduction to Freud, especially for those interested in his persuasive writing style and the field of psychoanalysis.