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Summary Of Sigmund Freud's Totem And Taboo

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In the book, Totem and Taboo by Sigmund Freud, Freud focuses on the commonly acknowledged cultural taboo against incest and studies how it structures primitive societies. He speculates on his concept of the Oedipal Complex and how it affects society as a whole. He wishes to establish a connection between the Oedipal Complex and the phenomenon of conscience, which involves the sense of a moral code governing our lives and our sense of guilt. In order to establish this connection, Freud discusses ambivalence, our belief in the omnipotence of our thoughts, and animal phobias and sacrificial rituals in order to make a sound, reasonable argument. Freud begins his book by comparing the psychological development between primitives, savages, and …show more content…

The male tribe members went to long measures to prevent incest, like hiding in bushes or running away from the female family member. Freud focuses on this idea of repressed incestuous desires that one innate has and has to constantly fight against, in order to fit in society. Freud deems this idea of incest and the killing of the totem animal as taboo, which is this idea of something being both clean/sacred and unclean/forbidden at the same time. Taboo is a prohibition forced upon people directed towards an internal, powerful desire that people want, but must avoid at all costs. The desire to violate this prohibition is deep in their unconscious. Freud acknowledges this internal desire and believes that: “the persistence of the taboo, namely that the original desire to do the prohibited thing must also still persist among the tribes concerned. They must therefore have an ambivalent attitude towards their taboos. In their unconscious there is nothing they would like more than to violate them, but they are afraid to do so and the fear is stronger than the desire. The desire is unconscious, however, in every individual member of the tribe just as it is in neurotics” (Freud 40). These people begin to have an ambivalent and guilty attitude towards what the taboo is actually inhibiting. They secretly, internally, unconsciously, love the idea of the prohibited act but ultimately feel guilty if they violate the tribal laws. This ambivalence

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