IPA Inter-Regional Encyclopedic Dictionary of Psychoanalysis

Back to Table of Contents

that the subject suffering from a traumatic neurosis hallucinates because he is unable either to reject or control by muscular innervation or ego countercathexes the psychological contents referring to the trauma i.e. the internal memories of the trauma, which arise spontaneously within him in the days following the trauma. These contents act very intensively within him for some duration of time, and cannot be avoided, thus causing him to suffer hallucinations in which he experiences the intense memories of what has happened to him not as a mere memory but as something real and external which is happening to him at that very moment” (Garma, 1969, pp. 488-489). In this context it then follows that “Dreams are hallucinations during sleep caused by the traumatic impact on the weakened ego of the sleeper of hitherto repressed psychic contents which the sleeping ego, being unable to control, thus accepts as real and forces into disguise, thus seeking to alleviate painful psychic tensions” (ibid, p. 491). The dream theory formulated in this way required the elaboration of a metapsychology of trauma from the structural theory point of view as well: “[...] the psyche of the traumatized can be considered divided into several instances: one, which is a parasitic instance created by an intense trauma that compels repetition, another, which is a Self submissive to that instance that repeats what is demanded, another, which is a healthy and sound Ego that … defends itself … from the compulsion to repetition and attempts to manage the instinctive forces (1978, p. 116). Later, the” parasitic instance “ is called superego (1978, p. 118). In this way, “neuroses are conditioned by a detrimental superego, reflecting a harmful external reality, subjecting the ego, forcing it to behave inappropriately and preventing it from managing the id in a harmonious way” (1978, pp. 118-119). In any neurotic symptom (on an individual as well as group level), a combination and conflictual interaction of forces that impose repetition and others that lead to their ‘ masking ’, as Freud (1939) stated in “Moses and Monotheism” is highlighted in Garma’s theorizong. In this context, Garma also redefines the concept of drives of life and death in relation to conceptualization of conflicts in masochism . In his view, life and death drives are not elemental forces, but they are the result of experiences encountered and internalized during the structuring of the psyche. Referring to the nations, which, following Freud can be interpreted as being analogical to a neurotic individual, Garma develops his conceptualization of the erotic and thanatic drives: “Among the reactions from past experiences that persist in the reactions of the present, some of them push any nation towards progress and well-being, while others, on the other hand, are more destructive and cause suffering, so that in a psychoanalytic theory it is possible to state, in a simplified way, that in a nation there are progressive, vital, tendencies or impulses and others that are regressive, self-destructive or deathly” (1978, p. 47). Pursuing the same subject elsewhere, he states: “ … [these] are based on considering pathological behaviors (...) as consecutive to their submissions and to aggressions directed against internalized persecuting objects, (...) which are mainly directed against genitality. In turn, those internal persecuting objects come from submission to their current, childlike and hereditary circumstances that are and have been harmful” (in: Raskovsky de Salvarezza (1974, p. 169).

49

Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online