Introduction to Sigmund Freud

Course Description

The teacher of this course, James Hollis, argues that we live in a post-Freudian era. We are all influenced by Freud and his theories have affected the way we think about the world and psychology today. 

The gift of Sigmund Freud’s thinking is that there is no longer the sense of egocentricity and sovereignty or its absolute importance. Freud replaced this notion with that of the unconscious. We now know that there is much more going on beneath the surface, and our conscious life is being in service to the unconscious drives and motives. This is an idea that we might take for granted today, but it was a revolutionary thought at the time. 

James Hollis, in his familiar engaging teaching style, eloquently discusses the main Freudian theories and concepts in this course. He offers several reading suggestions along the way, but it is not required that you read them. 

Sigmund Freud was born in Austria in 1856 and is the founder of psychoanalysis. Freud developed a friendship with Carl Jung and remained friends with him for several years. However, they split when there were insurmountable differences in their psychological thinking. 

In honor of the contribution that Freud made in the way we think and talk about psychology today, as well as his friendship with Jung, we offer this course here on Jung Platform. 

The recordings of this course were made at the Jung Center in Houston. Jung Platform has remastered the recordings. 

The classes are available now.

Course Preview:

This course is ideal if

• You are interested in learning more about Sigmund Freud.
• You want to understand why Jung and Freud connected well for a certain period.
• You enjoy finding out how our psychological thinking today is influenced by Freud.
• You aim to develop a sense of the psychoanalytic/ psychodynamic tradition and history.

Course Overview

Class 1: An introduction to Sigmund Freud

Freud developed his ideas organically with inspiration from his work with Charcot and Pierre Janet among others. In this class, Hollis gives an overview of Freud’s life and how the people that he met inspired his thinking. First, Hollis explores an overview of ideas popular in the world in which Freud was born, the running ideas at that time, and about psychology and the discovery of the unconscious. This class continues with the developmental process of several core concepts like neurosis, abreaction, catharsis, sexuality, defense mechanisms, libido fixation, instinct and socialization, and more. 

 

Class 2: Anna O. and the Wolfman

This class explores two historical cases of Freud: Anna O. (Bertha Pappenheim) and The Wolfman (Sergei Pankejeff).

Hollis explains why these cases were important and illustrates Freud’s theory while discussing these cases. These cases contain the foundations of psychoanalysis. Concepts considered in this class are: hysterical symptoms; the notion of repression; the technique of free association; the idea of resistance; defense and conversion neurosis; and transference and countertransference. James Hollis beautifully explains these concepts, while offering a different perspective for looking at these cases. While both cases were described as cured (even though  this has been disputed), Hollis encourages us to reexamine the way we look at these cases today. The diagnosis and treatment might not have been correct but these cases, including their ‘failures’ also contain important information, and significant discoveries came out of them. Hollis will show that several Freudian ideas are indispensable for a conscious life in this class.

 

Class 3: Freud’s view of dreams

This class covers Freud’s most important work and his favorite contribution: The Interpretation of Dreams (published in 1899 but dated 1900). One of this book’s contributions is that we see dreams as an extension of the experiences of our daily life and that dreams occur outside the range of consciousness. In the course of our daily life, so many places in our inner life are touched. Impossible to process during the day, phenomena of inner life go on outside consciousness, which could be seen as the dethronement of the human ego. 

In this class, Hollis addresses Freud’s dream about his patient Irma, explains what is meant by manifest and latent dream content, repression, interpreting dreams using the free association technique, the dream sensor, displacement, assimilation. Hollis shortly discusses the differences between Freud’s and Jung’s interpretation of dreams. 

 

Class 4:  Freud’s view on sexuality

Sexuality holds a central place in Freud’s theory. In addition, the context in which Freud presented these ideas was such that they were scandalous and controversial, bringing upon him charges of immorality. This class discusses Freud’s book: Three essays on the theory of sexuality. The three essays that Hollis talks about in this class are The Sexual Aberrations, Infantile Sexuality, and The Transformation of Puberty. The discussion of these essays includes the explanation of notions such as libido and the Oedipus complex. Hollis reviews Freud’s ideas and the second part of this class looks into Freud’s ideas of the structure of the psyche (id, ego, superego) and how this structure can be understood in relation to sexuality.

 

Class 5: Totem and Taboo

The fifth class is centered around Freud’s explorations of totem and taboo on which he published in Totem and Taboo: Some Points of Agreement between the Mental Lives of Savages and Neurotics. 

This class also covers the motive of patricide (killing of the father) and Freud’s assumption that Jung held a death wish against him.

 

Class 6: The power of the unconscious

Freud’s ideas about religion will be discussed in this final class using two of his works: Civilization and its discontents and Future of an Illusion.

James Hollis encourages us to look at where we are infantile, where we make fear-ridden decisions, and where we get caught up in magical thinking. He shows us with examples (of our dealing with fears and transferring power to another or Otherness) why the recognition of the power of the unconscious was the true gift in Freud’s thinking.

By the end of this course you will

• Be able to explain Freudian concepts and how Freud's Ideas are (still) relevant in our everyday lives.
• Have deepened your understanding and appreciation for Freud’s ideas.
• Identify and recognize Freudian concepts in human behavior.
• Develop a sense of psychoanalytic and psychodynamic tradition and history.
• Be able to explain that the gift of Freud’s ideas was his ‘discovery’ of the unconscious.