Abstract

PENNA, Carla  and  GARCIA, Claudia Amorim. Reflections on the concept of social unconscious. Rev. Subj. [online]. 2015, vol.15, n.1, pp. 46-56. ISSN 2359-0769.

The concept of unconscious is one of the cornerstones ofpsychoanalysis.However, in psychoanalytic theory it is possible to observe passages in whichthe discussion about this issue goes beyond the individual realm exploring relationships between subject and culture, phylogenetic inheritance and psychic transmission. Within this perspective, this paper aims to introduce the discussion on the concept of social unconscious pursuing its roots in Freudian Psychoanalysis and British Group Analysis. The methodology applied was a theoretical research.Under the leadership of the psychoanalysts and group-analysts Earl Hopper and Haim Weinberg, the article presents current research concerning its conceptualizations focusing on the interconnections between individual and society, the co-construction of social facts and the unconscious constraints and restraints in these relations. The article presents contributions of classical authors as Freud, Burrow, Fromm, Foulkes, Elias and Castoriadis as well as investigations of the contemporary scholars as Hopper, Weinberg, Dalal and Volkan. In the sequence, the paper points to psychoanalytic and group analytic research on trauma and psychic transmission in traumatized large groups. The study of the social unconscious is still in its beginning, but it will certainly add new dimensions to the investigation of the relationships between psychoanalysis and culture.

Keywords : unconscious; social unconscious; psychoanalysis; group analysis; trauma.

        · abstract in Portuguese | Spanish | French     · text in Portuguese     · Portuguese ( pdf )