Ebook: The Freud Files: An Inquiry Into the History of Psychoanalysis

How did psychoanalysis attain its prominent cultural position? Why has it become natural to bracket Freud with revolutionaries like Copernicus and Darwin? How did Freud "triumph" to such a degree that we hardly remember his rivals, despite the fact that many of his theories have been hotly contested - and often discredited - in the century since they were proposed?The Freud Files reconstructs the early controversies around psychoanalysis and shows that rather than demonstrating its superiority, Freud and his fol-lowers rescripted history. Incorporating primary material including letters and interviews, this account demonstrates the extraordinary apparatus by which the would-be science of psychoanalysis installed itself in contemporary socie-ties. Beyond psychoanalysis, it opens up the history of the modern psycho-logical sciences; how they furnished the ideas we have of ourselves; and how they became solidified into indisputable "facts." [C:UsersMicrosoftDocumentsCalibre Library]