Literature Review on Dreams: Sigmund Freud's Psychoanalysis

The relationship between dreaming and repression is complex and requires thorough understanding of Freud’s theory thus it is better to get to know some of the terms and concepts Freud raises in study of dreams. As all the information is gathered, it is believed that the wish as fulfilled is shown only in a state of repression during sleep.

Many will argue that Freud’s ideas have exerted a profound influence on twentieth –century thought and culture, though his work has come under scrutiny, it has shape the fundamentals of society view on civilization and discontents, dreams, psychoanalysis and the unconscious. For this paper, I will be discussing Freud’s fundamentals of dreams, what dreams represents, how dreams are constructed and its significance while paying close attention to the following areas of dreams, manifest and latent content, condensation and displacement, and censorship and repression.

The point of view of which Freud interprets and examines the manifest of dreams content to obtain their latent meaning is of a professional psychologist and clinical observer who looked for a way to explain how our minds work and how the individual psychology functions. He based his work on clinical experiences and clinical neurosis of the matter of his own interpretations to be able to confirm his theories as a proven fact. The result Freud gets from the patients he observes and interpretation of their dreams are stereotyped to the complete human condition.

Freud found two meanings in a dream: the manifest meaning and the latent meaning (Freud 168). The manifest meaning of a dream is what is remembered upon waking (Felluga). The manifest meaning can reflect a situation that follows common sense and unfold in a way possible in waking life. Other times it can take its own wild path that follows little or no logical sequence when viewed at surface level. Despite this vast difference, both of these are influenced by the superego, a part of the mind that Freud believes houses the knowledge of the structure of society and what is acceptable in the dreamers culture. The dream takes place on a stage or backdrop that makes sense and relates to waking life (Freud 216-17). While the manifest meaning is useful and can itself contain a message, interpretation of it can reveal more than seen at face value.

Both Freud and Jung provided important and interesting theories on dreams; encompassing their functions, their roots, and their meanings. Freud looked at dreams as a result of repressed memories, particularly repressed sexual memories from our childhood. Jung however, believed that dreams delved beyond sexual repression during younger years, to other problems, be it trauma, anxiety etc. Jung also believed dreams changed predominately through middle adult years, while Freud believed the opposite. There is little empirical evidence to reinforce either Freud or Jung’s theories, however, their contributions to the study of dreams in psychology cannot be lessened or denied.

Freud also listed the following results from his studies, dreams can have multiple layers of meaning, nearly all dreams are wish-fulfilling, and all dreams have a unifying motive that accounts for all random images and events. Freud concluded that dreams are the way an individual 's unconscious mind tries to express itself and that dreams “may only have a chance of reaching our consciousness if they are somewhat disguised”. Which explains the sometimes absurd and bizarre dreams that someone can get. Sigmund Freud uses the following analogy to explain his theory, “a political writer may criticize a ruler, but in doing so may endanger himself. The writer therefore has to fear the ruler’s censorship, and in doing so “moderates and distorts the expression of his opinion”. The writer serves to represent the unconscious mind, while the ruler is the conscious mind that stops an individual from doing certain things. Dreams and daydreams are practically synonymous, except dreams occur when an individual sleeps, and daydreams are when the person is awake, but both allow for the mind to wander, so the theory can apply to both, but Freud mainly focuses on the aspects of dreams.

After a friend told me about some weird dreams he had been having I decided to research the meaning of dreams. I will focus on Sigmund Freud’s idea that understanding our dreams can help us to understand ourselves, and live a much happier and fulfilled life. Freud was known as “the father of psychoanalysis” and in 1899 he wrote his most famous work, The Interpretation of Dreams, and

Dreaming is said to be something that is very important to us as a human. Freud believe that dreams help us get into the unconscious material. When in the process of doing dream analysis the patient will talk about their manifest dreams which are the dreams the patient can remember. Once they have done this the therapist will find symbols that were said and then use those symbols to find meaning to

By analyzing dreams, Freud believed that it could lead to understanding the most mysterious part of the human body: the brain. He viewed dreams as the unconscious mind making an endeavor to resolve a conflict regardless of when the conflict arose (Freud, 1900, p.577). Freud eventually developed a theory that the symbols and images in dreams may only be the front for multiple connotations, linking icons in dreams to parts of the body and biological drives. The dreamer may “find the top part of a clarinet in the street or the mouth-piece of a tobacco-pipe” in response to stimuli from male sexual organs (Freud, 1900, p.111). Freud argued in many of his early works that many latent dreams are sexual in nature. These connections separated Freud from his colleagues, such as Carl

“Dreams are a series of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations occurring involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep.” This is the true definition of what dreams are according to Free Dictionary.com. Although many people are unaware of how dreams actually work there are two psychologists that have been able to pinpoint the true meaning of dreams. These two men are Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. There are many different perceptions on how people dream, what dreams mean, and why people dream.

Freud’s theory is that dreaming is meaningful, unlike the activation synthesis theory. He believed that the mind had three sections, represented in a shape of an iceberg; the conscious, the subconscious and the unconscious. The conscious is the tip of the iceberg above the water involves everything we are aware of right now such as our thoughts. The

In his lecture, “Revision of the Theory of Dreams” Freud makes it apparent that this theory alone stands as the basis for the entirety of Psycho-Analysis, he writes, “Whenever I begin to have doubts of the correctness of my wavering conclusions, the successful transformation of a senseless and muddled dream into a logical and intelligible

Sigmund Freud’s theory of dreams suggested that dreams represented unconscious desires, thoughts, and motivations. According to Freud’s psychoanalytic view of personality,

Freud believed that dreams represent repressed desires, dears and conflicts. He distinguished two aspects of dreams: the manifest content (Actual event) and the latent content (symbolic meaning of the event). In Freud’s latent content all of the symbolic meanings had a sexual background. He viewed dreams as revealing conflicts in a condensed and intensified form.

In his book, Modern Man In Search Of A Soul, C.G. Jung gives a layperson insight into his ideas on dream analysis. Jung's primary objective in this book is to educate the reader as to what a psychoanalyst does when analyzing a patient's dreams. The principal message in the section of the book centered on dream analysis is that dreams should never stand alone. Dreams are meaningless in a vacuum, but on the other hand when put against a strict set of rules, they are oftentimes misunderstood. The unconscious is a fluid entity and cannot be handled either in isolation or with a static set of guidelines. Dreams are reflections of the unconscious and can represent many different things inside of