CIVILIZATION AND ITS DISCONTENTS

CIVILIZATION AND ITS DISCONTENTS
By Sigmund Freud

Synopsis
Sigmund Freud begins his long essay, Civilization and Its Discontents, by describing his inability to understand what he calls "religious feeling." Freud is not religious himself, though he has good friends who are. Freud believes that religion is central to how societies function even societies that no longer consist of orthodox believers. Freud attempts, in his essay, to understand how people relate to their societies, how societies are formed, and how individual psychic forces interact with larger, group-level forces. Freud isolates the individual's ego, superego, and id the self, the regulating self, and deep, base desires as the three forces inherent on the personal level. He wonders how these forces are manifest on the social level.

Freud's essay moves organically that is, not in a strict order, but by association of related ideas. Freud wonders how religions function in society, and sees in religion a kind of generous, selfless love at least, this love as an ideal. Freud wonders whether societies are held together by this selfless love, and by its related religious feeling, but states that these instances of generosity alone cannot constitute a society.

File information:
File size (Digital) (144kb)
Books (1)
Biography (Yes)
Originally published in (1930)
Special quotations (Yes)
Originally published (1930)
Page count (8.5x11) (88)
Word count (33,769)
Font size (12pt)

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