Abstract

ANDRADE, Fernando Cézar Bezerra de. Masochism’s metapsychology: Freud and Laplanche. Estud. psicanal. [online]. 2011, n.36, pp.55-68. ISSN 0100-3437.

Considering the contradiction of getting pleasure from pain, the masochism is discussed from the perspective of two metapsychological models, Freud’s and Laplanche’s. The Freudian metapsychology about masochism is characterized by two distinct and opposed theories, whose formulations suffer the effects of the change in the drives’ theory from 1920 on. We follow Laplanche’s review on Freud’s theories, in order to underline the Generalized Seduction Theory’s model. According to this paradigm, masochism is a characteristic of the child’s position in relation with adults: at the beginning, in the anthropological fundamental situation, the dissymmetry between children and their parents puts children in a masochistic position. So, Freud’s assertion about primary masochism has meaning only if the autoerotism is interpreted from the angles of alterity, to explain child’s narcissism originally as a solution to the attack of the adult’s unconscious sexual desires.

Keywords : Masochism; Metapsychology; Freudian theory; Theory of Generalized Seduction.

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