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Abstract
This article considers how visionary art expresses itself within paintings and pictorial configurations by using Neumann’s work to expand on Jung’s notion of the ‘visionary mode of creativity.’ The first part is a comparative study of Neumann’s ‘four stages of psychological development’ discussed in ‘The Origins and History of Consciousness’ (1949) and his ‘four stages of art in relation to its epoch’ discussed in his essay ‘Art and Time’ (1959). This comparison aims to establish a selection of categories that considers the role of art on the micro-level (the individual) and the macro-level (society). Additionally, it is suggested that these four categories offer an interesting framework for identifying and understanding visionary artworks. Subsequently, the second part uses Neumann’s framework to examine a selection of paintings from ‘Liber Novus’ (2009).
Abstract
The era in which we live is known geologically as the anthropocene. Conceptualizing it as a psychological phenomenon is rare; this article contributes to that effort. The anthropocene is a potent symbol of destruction, active in psyches of both individuals and the collective. Jung’s Answer to Job examined apocalyptic tragedy in one man’s life. A feature of that tragedy was distinct roles: perpetrator and victim. Considering the apocalyptic possibilities of the anthropocene requires less-distinct separation of those roles. In these times, people’s responses to threat illustrate how the anthropocene is psychologically burdensome, for some people more than others. As do other symbols, the anthropocene places both interior demands and external responsibilities on the psyche. Some are presented, to illustrate a Jungian perspective on the psychological problems and healing imperatives of the era in which we live.
Abstract
Jung’s conception, his articulation, and his relationship to the anima and animus and then more current thoughts and relationships to them, a deeper understanding of the archetype and its future manifestations in the unconscious are examined. When one considers how Jung developed his theory of the anima and animus and the gender-bias that he demonstrates in his articulation of the concept, one can understand why the concept was then, and continues to be, difficult to grasp. Jung was a product of his time and so it is with the changes in gender roles and the rise in awareness of the LGBTQ community that new ideas are surfacing about how to view the archetypes of anima and animus. Within this research, Hillman and other post-Jungian theorists lend their opinions and elucidations of the anima/animus archetype with major revisions and questions raised for consideration. Connections between contemporary gender issues are addressed, especially feminism and transgenderism. Questions for further research and consideration such as the relationship between psychic reality, biological reality, and neurological reality and the relationships between the individual unconscious and the collective unconscious in relation to gender are posed. To conclude, Jung seems to have moved into a place of greater wisdom and relation to his unconscious material over the course of his life, perhaps signalling future relations between anima and animus, i.e. the inner other gendered archetype, in both individuals and society.
Abstract
According to the Kabbalistic Lurianic mysticism, the divine light fell into the world because of the rupture of the vessels. The sparks of light became alienated from their transcendent origin and have to be reunified. Likewise, for Jung, individuation is a process of wholeness and reclaiming to consciousness splits of the psyche. The Lurianic myth may be an archetypal motif of the psyche. It may also be viewed as an imaginal field where transformation occurs, with an activation of the archetype of the Self, the birth of a new relationship to the Self, and a new attitude towards the world.
Abstract
Within William Shakespeare’s play Coriolanus, the title character Caius Martius Coriolanus refers to himself as a “lonely dragon.” This image of a dragon in the play represents a powerful fusion of Celtic, Nordic, and classical myth as well as Christian theology—all of which contain depictions of dragons. Reading Martius as a dragon, using Jungian and archetypal terms mediated through Icelandic literature, unveils Shakespeare’s use of myth to fashion Caius Martius’s transformation into an untamable anti-social beast whose primal violence and aggression ultimately leads to his slaying by Aufidius, the dragon-like dragon-slayer.
Abstract
Blind spots have resulted in dimensions of human experience that were simply not “seen,” or when seen, were not recognized as relevant for a fuller understanding of what it means to be human. Sexuality, religion, race, subjectivity, and gender were at one point unseen and then ‘discovered’ by psychologists. This essay examines three forms of cultural and psychological blindness related to the field of psychology of religion. (a) The normative impact of culture on the psyche. A plethora of psychological processes (cognition, memory, perception, emotion, identity, and so on) reflect the impact of the culture in which we live our lives. After considerable research demonstrating the cultural context of psyche, it became apparent that the normative culture shaping the field of psychology was, in fact, the social force of Western, modernist values. b) For much of the past century psychology studied the religion of the abstracted, autonomous, unbounded individual on the assumption that to describe a single person was in reality to observe generic human identity and religiosity. In the past 30 years, however, we have discovered that at macro and micro levels how embedded spirituality is in cultures that co constitute our subjectivity. c) At a deeper level there is the blind spot identified by recent anthropological research. Ontological assumptions have blinded the researcher to the integrity of spirituality in exotic cultures. The result has been the marginalization of spiritualities deemed irrational. It is argued that this lack understanding of spirituality in local culture is, in part, because religious traditions in different local cultures are ontologically different.