Castration anxiety
Encyclopedia
Castration anxiety is the fear
of emasculation
in both the literal and metaphorical sense.
In Freudian psychoanalysis
Castration anxiety (Kastrationsangst) refers to an unconscious fear of penile loss originating during the phallic stage
of sexual development and lasting a lifetime. According to Freud, when the infantile male becomes aware of differences between male and female genitalia he assumes that the female's penis has been removed and becomes anxious that his penis will be cut off by his rival, the father figure, as punishment for desiring the mother figure.
In 19th century Europe
it was not unheard of for parents to threaten their misbehaving sons with castration
or otherwise threaten their genitals. This theme is explored in the story Tupik by French writer Michel Tournier
in his collection of stories entitled Le Coq de Bruyère (1978) and is a phenomenon Freud documents several times. This may help to explain Freud's reasoning regarding castration anxiety's role in human development
.
Symbolic castration anxiety refers to the fear of being degraded, dominated or made insignificant, usually an irrational fear where the person will go to extreme lengths to save their pride and/or perceives trivial things as being degrading making their anxiety restrictive and sometimes damaging.
This can also tie in with literal castration anxiety in fearing the loss of virility or sexual dominance.
Fear
Fear is a distressing negative sensation induced by a perceived threat. It is a basic survival mechanism occurring in response to a specific stimulus, such as pain or the threat of danger...
of emasculation
Emasculation
Emasculation is the removal of the genitalia of a male, notably the penis and/or the testicles.By extension, the word has also come to mean to render a male less of a man, or to make a male feel less of a man by humiliation. This metaphorical usage of the word is much more common than the...
in both the literal and metaphorical sense.
Literal
Castration anxiety is the conscious or unconscious fear of losing all or part of the sex organs, or the function of such.In Freudian psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is a psychological theory developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud. Psychoanalysis has expanded, been criticized and developed in different directions, mostly by some of Freud's former students, such as Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav...
Castration anxiety (Kastrationsangst) refers to an unconscious fear of penile loss originating during the phallic stage
Phallic stage
In Freudian psychology, the Phallic stage is the third stage of psychosexual development, spanning the ages of three to six years, wherein the infant’s libido centers upon his or her genitalia as the erogenous zone...
of sexual development and lasting a lifetime. According to Freud, when the infantile male becomes aware of differences between male and female genitalia he assumes that the female's penis has been removed and becomes anxious that his penis will be cut off by his rival, the father figure, as punishment for desiring the mother figure.
In 19th century Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
it was not unheard of for parents to threaten their misbehaving sons with castration
Castration
Castration is any action, surgical, chemical, or otherwise, by which a male loses the functions of the testicles or a female loses the functions of the ovaries.-Humans:...
or otherwise threaten their genitals. This theme is explored in the story Tupik by French writer Michel Tournier
Michel Tournier
Michel Tournier is a French writer.His works are highly considered and have won important awards such as the Grand Prix du roman de l'Académie française in 1967 for Friday, or, The Other Island and the Prix Goncourt for The Erl-King in 1970...
in his collection of stories entitled Le Coq de Bruyère (1978) and is a phenomenon Freud documents several times. This may help to explain Freud's reasoning regarding castration anxiety's role in human development
Developmental psychology
Developmental psychology, also known as human development, is the scientific study of systematic psychological changes, emotional changes, and perception changes that occur in human beings over the course of their life span. Originally concerned with infants and children, the field has expanded to...
.
Metaphorical
Castration anxiety can also refer to being castrated symbolically.Symbolic castration anxiety refers to the fear of being degraded, dominated or made insignificant, usually an irrational fear where the person will go to extreme lengths to save their pride and/or perceives trivial things as being degrading making their anxiety restrictive and sometimes damaging.
This can also tie in with literal castration anxiety in fearing the loss of virility or sexual dominance.
See also
- EmasculationEmasculationEmasculation is the removal of the genitalia of a male, notably the penis and/or the testicles.By extension, the word has also come to mean to render a male less of a man, or to make a male feel less of a man by humiliation. This metaphorical usage of the word is much more common than the...
- Penis envyPenis envyPenis envy in Freudian psychoanalysis refers to the theorized reaction of a girl during her psychosexual development to the realization that she does not have a penis....
- Genital retraction syndromeGenital retraction syndromeKoro is a culture-specific syndrome from Southeast Asia in which the patient has an overpowering belief that his penis is shrinking and will shortly disappear. Also known as shrinking penis, the syndrome is listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders...
- Vagina dentataVagina dentataVagina dentata is Latin for toothed vagina. Various cultures have folk tales about women with toothed vaginas, frequently told as cautionary tales warning of the dangers of sex with strange women and to discourage the act of rape....
- Oedipus ComplexOedipus complexIn psychoanalytic theory, the term Oedipus complex denotes the emotions and ideas that the mind keeps in the unconscious, via dynamic repression, that concentrate upon a boy’s desire to sexually possess his mother, and kill his father...
- Anti-ŒdipusAnti-ŒdipusAnti-Oedipus is a book by the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze and the psychoanalyst Félix Guattari. It is the first volume of Capitalism and Schizophrenia, the second being A Thousand Plateaus ....
- Jacques LacanJacques LacanJacques Marie Émile Lacan was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist who made prominent contributions to psychoanalysis and philosophy, and has been called "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud". Giving yearly seminars in Paris from 1953 to 1981, Lacan influenced France's...
- PhallogocentrismPhallogocentrismIn critical theory and deconstruction, phallogocentrism or phallocentrism is a neologism coined by Jacques Derrida to refer to the privileging of the masculine in the construction of meaning....
- Luce IrigarayLuce IrigarayLuce Irigaray is a Belgian feminist, philosopher, linguist, psychoanalyst, sociologist and cultural theorist. She is best known for her works Speculum of the Other Woman and This Sex Which Is Not One .-Biography:...