Basic works of Freud: GPHI 6072

CRN 6638

FA 2011

Dr. Alan Bass

“Words, Language, Sympathy”

Amy Ramírez

N00197003

November 3, 2012

Words, Language, Sympathy

§289. “When I say ‘I am in pain’ I am at any rate justified before myself.” – What

does that mean? Does it mean: “If someone else could know what I am calling ‘pain’, he

would admit that I was using the word correctly”?

To use a word without justification does not mean to use without right.

Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations

Let us consider the epigraph above.

1. Suppose that to be incoherent, to be belligerent or to be mute cannot be justified - but

can be right.

2. Suppose that sound or silence is right if understood by a sympathetic soul.

3. Suppose Freud is such a soul.

What follows is a study of Freud’s writings; theories and clinical observations.

This study elucidates Freud’s attention to words and language as a way of cultivating and

exercising psychoanalytic theory. Remarks from his writings and that of others are

analyzed in three sections. To conclude this paper I will discuss Freud’s attention to

language as a gateway to the meaning of “right” used in the epigraph.

I

WORDS, LANGUAGE, APHASIA

In discussing aphasia, Freud focuses on words used, or not used, in clinical and

ordinary environments. This discussion composes subsection (i) 1. In elaborating his

emphasis on words and their function, he uses mechanisms later adapted to

psychoanalytic theory. The elaboration composes subsection (ii).

1 All citations, references and quotations in Section I (i) derive from: Davison, C. (1955).

On Aphasia (A Critical Study). Psychoanal. Q., 24:115-119

I (i)

Two years before the publication of Studies on Hysteria (1893), Freud published

On Aphasia (1891). The text concerns Wernicke’s contribution “to the understanding of

so-called sensory aphasia.” Wernicke’s contribution demonstrated “that in sensory

aphasia there is loss of understanding of speech with preservation of the ability to use

articulate language.” Wernicke concluded that this aphasia stems from “lesions of the

first temporal convolution.” More specifically, Wernicke held that fibers store

impressions and fibers are distinct from “speech centers”. Wernicke indicated that motor

and sensory speech centers are connected by fibers “in the island of Reil” where “word-

sound-image” associations and “kinesthetic word impressions” are formed.

Equally important is Wernicke’s proposition of a distinct aphasia termed “conduct

aphasia”, defined by “confusion of words and uncertainty in their use with preservation

of normal comprehension and articulation”. This is a sophisticated departure from

sensory aphasia. Wernicke explained the difference as the “destruction of the white fibers

only of the insula.” Freud contests this explanation and moves away from a theory of

speech centers towards a theory of speech apparatuses.

Freud considers it “’tempting to regard [conduct aphasia] in the widest sense as a

purely functional symptom, a sign of reduced efficiency of the apparatus of speech

associations.’” Furthermore, “[strict] consideration of all 'conduction aphasias' leads to

the conclusion that '… the destruction of a so-called center comes about only through

simultaneous interruption of several fiber tracts'”. Freud insists mental activity should not

be perceived solely as localized functions, but as part of processes “spread widely over

the entire brain.” Freud rejects that conduct aphasia is the deterioration of fibers

exclusively.

In deference to consistency, Freud rejected similar theories that postulated

localized functions. For example, Grashey “attributed a certain type of disorder to

alteration of a functional constant in the speech apparatus. [Grashey] believed that

disturbances of speech fall into two groups, one due to localized lesions, and the other

(the amnesias) due to functional change not localized.” In response, Freud “postulates the

idea… that 'the so-called speech centers as wholes reacted to partial damages with a

modification of function'.” Again, Freud insists mental activity should not be perceived

solely as localized functions but as part of larger, complex, processes. He believes proper

functioning and malfunctioning occur across several parts of the brain.

Freud rejects Meynert’s theory of the organization of the brain as well. Meynert

postulates a “doctrine of the organization of the brain and of the localization of concepts

in the cortex.” Instead Freud:

The apparatus of speech consists of an ill-defined continuous cortical area in the

left hemisphere which is connected with the cortical field of the right hemisphere

via the corpus callosum… The representation of the periphery of the body in the

cerebral cortex is not topographical but functional… The 'relationship between the

chain of physiological events in the nervous system and the mental processes is

probably not one of cause and effect. The former do not cease when the latter set

in; they tend to continue. The psychical is therefore a process parallel to the

physiological, a "dependent concomitant". (ibid).

Freud persists in his belief that brain functions occur across several parts of the brain. He

insists that functionality is interdependent. He insists the physiological events (aphasias)

are separate from events in the nervous system. He insists the psychical is distinct from

the physiological. Thus he considers aphasias and speech articulation to be a psychical

event stemming from and dependent on complex, interdependent, physical functions.

Freud follows Hughlings Jackson's warning against a confusion of the physical

with the psychical in the study of the function of speech. As Davidson explains, Freud

says:

Our consciousness contains nothing that would, from the psychological point of

view, justify the term "latent memory image". Yet whenever the same cortical

state is elicited again, the previous psychic event re-emerges as a memory… We

cannot have a perception without immediately associating it. Perception and

association belong to one single process which, starting from one point, spreads

over the whole cortex… With this refutation of a separate localization for ideation

and association of ideas we have disposed of an important reason for

differentiating between centers and pathways of speech. In every part of the

cortex serving speech, we have to assume similar functional processes, and we

have no need to call on white fiber tracts for the association of ideas within the

cortex.' He thus refutes the localization theory of Meynert, Wernicke and others,

and supports Hughlings Jackson's point of view that 'even in normal persons, as

common in aphasias, … [a vigorous curse] belongs to the emotional and not to the

intellectual language… We refuse to separate the process of the idea from that of

association, and to localize the two in separate parts.'

This passage explicates Freud’s beliefs succinctly. Words recall memories. Perceiving

words and associating words with memories belongs to a process that is spread across the

entire cortex. The ability to recollect memories justifies abjuration of theories anchored in

centralized functionality. Every part of the cortex serving speech behaves similarly to the

process of memory recollection. Proper or improper articulation is a psychical event.

These pivotal claims are further explicated below. Davidson says:

Freud explains in greater detail why he refuses to localize the psychic elements of

the process of speech in specific areas of the speech centers, which he believes to

be parts of the cortex that have a pathological, but no special physiological,

significance. He adopts as a guiding principle Hughlings Jackson's doctrine that

all reactions of the apparatus of speech to pathological conditions are instances of

functional retrogression of a highly organized apparatus, and 'therefore correspond

to earlier states of its functional development'. He rejects Wernicke's, Lichtheim's,

and Meynert's differentiation between so-called central or cortical aphasias and

'conduction' (association) aphasias, and maintains that all aphasias originate in

interruptions of associations, that is of conduction. According to Freud, the word

is, from the psychological point of view, the functional unit of speech; it is a

complex of auditory, visual, and kinesthetic elements which are connected with

another complex of object associations. He states, 'The safeguards of our speech

against breakdown appear overdetermined'. The process of learning to read,

according to Freud, is very complicated and entails a frequent shift of the

directions of the associations. The word acquires its significance through its

association with the idea.

Here Freud makes a crucial turn. His careful work in neurology and his rigorous study on

aphasia have lead to a decisive shift in ideology. Hitherto, I have delineated Freud’s

interdependent theory of functionality. The passage above explains Freud’s views further.

Freud believes processes of speech are psychic and pathological. He believes all aphasic

instances of retrogression point to their previous pathologies. He believes speech, or the

word, is the tool by which one can gage appropriate or degenerated pathological

associations. He believes theories anchored in localization generate an over-determined

and erroneous description of brain functioning and that the process of learning to read

testifies to pathological associations. Lastly, He believes a “word acquires its significance

through its association with the idea”.

Freud’s innovative ideology reaches beyond his study of aphasias. Freud observes

that instances of degenerated pathological associations “’may occur in most typical form

as organic focal symptoms.'” Thus, Freud suggests, the trademark of aphasic patients

“does not differ” from “the incorrect use and distortion of words” effectuated by “healthy

persons in states of fatigue or divided attention or under the influence of disturbing

affects.” Conceiving of mental activity as expansive and complex, not exclusively

functional, allows Freud to see characteristics of conduct aphasia beyond clinical

environments within ordinary circumstances.

Freud sees the ordinary deterioration of clear and appropriate speech as proof of

disorientation. In a grand sense, Freud sees the word as “the functional unit of speech; it

is a complex of auditory, visual, and kinesthetic elements which are connected with

another complex of object associations.” For Freud, words determine and result from

healthy mental activity simultaneously.

I (ii) 2

On Aphasia blooms with attention to words and the pathological associations from

whence they derive. Section I (i) follows Freud’s departure from localized theories of

functionality to a theory of associations that speak to instances of disorientation in

clinical and ordinary circumstances. Section I (ii) delves into Freud’s budding theories on

words and pathological associations.

Freud says:

I now propose to consider what hypotheses are required to explain disturbances of

speech on the basis of a speech apparatus constructed in this manner—in other

words, what the study of disturbance of speech teaches us about the function of

this apparatus. In doing so I shall keep the psychological and anatomical sides of

the question as separate as possible.

In the passage above Freud assumes speech apparatuses are constructed as an association

of physiological and psychological networks, then endeavors to cultivate the hypotheses

that explain the degeneration of networks. First, Freud specifies that:

From the point of view of psychology the unit of the function of speech is the

‘word’, a complex presentation, which proves to be a combination put together from

auditory, visual and kinaesthetic elements. We owe our knowledge of this

combination to pathology, which shows us that in organic lesions of the apparatus of

speech a disintegration of speech takes place along the lines on which the

combination is put together.

2 All citations, references and quotations in Section I(ii) derive from Apendix C of the

editor’s note to “The Unconscious”: Freud, S. (1915). The Unconscious. The Standard

Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume XIV (1914-

1916): On the History of the Psycho-Analytic Movement, Papers on Metapsychology and

Other Works, 159-215. Psychoanalytic Electronic Publishing. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.

The psychological network culminates with the ‘word’, which is representative (and

determinate) of the relationship between auditory, visual and kinesthetic functioning. The

deterioration of the associations is evinced when we use words inappropriately or out of

context. The details regarding the combination and formation of elements comprising the

association is explicated further below. However, Freud also says:

We shall thus expect to find that the absence of one of these elements of the word-

presentation will prove to be the most important indication for enabling us to arrive

at a localization of the disease.

The phrase “word-presentation” here indicates that the word is representative of an

association between the word and the image it conjures within the mind. When an

element of the association is disturbed (by trauma or phobia), one is better able to locate

disruption within this network by focusing on the absent element of the association.

Freud better describes associations, saying, “four components of the word-presentation

are… [comprised of] the ‘sound-image’, the ‘visual letter-image’, the ‘motor speech-

image’ and the ‘motor writing-image’.” Therefore the alterations to our associations

occur at the auditory, visual or kinesthetic junctures.

Freud believes degenerations of the speech apparatus occur within the visual,

auditory or kinesthetic combinations of functioning. Hypotheses regarding the auditory

and kinesthetic functioning are elaborated below. First:

(1) We learn to speak by associating a ‘sound-image of a word’ with a ‘sense of the

innervation of a word’. After we have spoken, we are also in possession of a

‘motor speech-presentation’ (centripetal sensations from the organs of speech);

so that, in a motor respect, the ‘word’ is doubly determined for us.

First one’s palate associates the sound of a word with the motor skills required to produce

an articulation of a word. Thus words are ‘doubly determined’ by the way they sound and

our ability to articulate them. Freud notes that children exhibit this skill as do motor

aphasics in that both associate their attempts at controlled speech with the meaningful

and proper articulations of healthy, mature, persons. Secondly:

(2) We learn to speak the language of other people by endeavouring to make the

sound-image produced by ourselves as like as possible to the one which gave rise to

our speech-innervation. We learn in this way to ‘repeat’—to ‘say after’ another

person. When we juxtapose words in connected speech, we hold back the

innervation of the next word till the sound-image or the motor speech-presentation

(or both) of the preceding word has reached us.

We use our motor skills to mimic the articulations of others and produce meaningful

sounds, or words. There is a clear sense of boundaries and silence between words and

meaningful uses of words. We mimic the kinesthetic functions of others to speak and be

silent in the conventional ways we observe in others.

Altogether, these hypotheses treat speech apparatuses as combinations of complex

associations. Again, this is a grand departure from the localized theories described in

Section I(i). These hypothesis cultivate a sense of neurological functioning that is

conditional on several parts of the brain that work together and possibly deteriorate

together. As a whole these functions work together to form speech apparatuses.

Freud cultivates the principles of these hypotheses along broader frameworks. He

says:

It is to be assumed that later on too, we carry out these different functions of speech

along the same associative paths as those along which we learnt them. At this later

stage, abbreviations and substitutions may occur, but it is not always easy to say

what their nature is. Their importance is diminished by the consideration that in

cases of organic lesion the apparatus of speech will probably be damaged to some

extent as a whole and be compelled to return to the modes of association which are

primary, well-established and lengthier.

Freud considers that our associative paths become entrenched, strengthened and more

complex simultaneously as we age and grow. We might abbreviate certain signals, and

substitute particular images and presentations, we might even alter kinesthetic behaviors.

These nuances are insignificant, however, because they do not signify a degeneration of

the speech apparatus. Deterioration of the speech apparatus is marked by simplicity,

juxtaposed to the complexity exhibited by those who are mature and healthy. The

simplicity of the deteriorated speech apparatus is reflected in its primitive use of

associations; simple words and sounds connecting with simple images and motor skills.

These connections are the basis of cognitive functioning, and we return to these

functions, as do aphasiacs, once our speech apparatus is harmed.

Broader frameworks of complex and simple apparatuses are considered in section

II of this essay. To conclude section I, it will suffice to say Freud’s sophisticated and

radical treatment of words began as review of theories on aphasia and a departure from

conventional doctrine. Freud’s careful consideration of words and their psychological and

physiological significance, to aphasiacs and laymen, then inspired several tenets of

psychoanalysis. These tenets are explored below.

II

WORDS, LANGUAGE, PSYCHOANALYSIS

There are moments within Freud’s psychoanalytic writings where he pays

attention to words and associations. Within his theoretical writings and case studies he

examines the impact of words and neurological associations. With a discussion on words

and associations presented above, it is now possible to conduct a fecund review of

Freud’s psychoanalytic theories and case studies.

Before developing such a review, I will state the gist of psychoanalytic theory and

assume the reader possesses a sophisticated understanding of the terms at hand. In its

simplest form, psychoanalytic theory states: A trauma that correlates love with loss or

sexuality with shame results in a phobia or obsession that manifests as hysteria or

neuroses. This simple statement helps to elucidate the review that is to follow. Section

II(i) will address the influence of dependant concomitants on psychoanalytic theory.

Section I(ii) will address the influence of words on psychoanalytic practice.

II(i)

In “Preliminary Communication” from Studies on Hysteria, we see the case of a

young girl who spoke in English for eighteen months after suffering a traumatic episode

at the bedside of an ailing soul. An except of the passage is replicated below:

A girl, watching beside a sick-bed in a torment of anxiety, fell into a twilight state

and had a terrifying hallucination, while her right arm, which was hanging over

the back of her chair, went to sleep; from this there developed a paresis of the

same arm accompanied by contracture and anaesthesia. She tried to pray but

could find no words; at length she succeeded in repeating a children's prayer in

English. When subsequently a severe and highly complicated hysteria developed,

she could only speak, write and understand English, while her native language

remained unintelligible to her for eighteen months.

Section I(i) of this paper discusses Freud’s rejection of Meynert’s theory on the

organization of the brain. There, Freud claims the physiological and psychical processes

run parallel within the brain. The psychical process is a ‘dependent concomitant’ to the

physiological process. In this way, too, there was a parallel and dependent association of

words and hysteria formed within the psyche of the young girl when she experienced

trauma at the bedside of the ill. She was in a state of anxiety, thus distressing her psyche.

She entered a twilight state, leaving her vulnerable to psychical interference. She

experienced a hallucination as a result of harnessing anxiety while in twilight state and

thus suffered a trauma. The trauma led to a “condition seconde”3 in which she developed

an associative network that was distinct from her original network of words and

3 Defined in “Preliminary Communications”.

association. This new association expressed itself as an inability to access her native

tongue. For eighteen months, she could only understand and speak English. Freud

elaborates on condition seconde, saying:

But the causal relation between the determining psychical trauma and the

hysterical phenomenon is not of a kind implying that the trauma merely acts like

an agent provocateur in releasing the symptom, which thereafter leads an

independent existence. We must presume rather that the psychical trauma —or

more precisely the memory of the trauma—acts like a foreign body which long

after its entry must continue to be regarded as an agent that is still at work…

(ibid).

I attribute Freud’s ability to develop such a theory to his earlier work on dependent

concomitants in which he postulated the idea of parallel processes4. Freud is able to

verify his insights on psychical processes by examining the words the young girl used

and did not use during her hysterical episode. He saw the word as the functional unit of

her speech apparatus and determined that her inability to use her native tongue testified to

the disruption of her original associations. Focusing on words allowed Freud to reconnect

with her and understand the physiological changes she endured. The condition seconde is

a far departure from her native state in which she spoke and understood her native

language. During her hysteria, she maintained two distinct speech apparatuses, though

one lay dormant. The active and passive expressions of each apparatus functioned as

interdependent processes. Her ability to sustain and recuperate her native language skills

validates Freud’s theory of dependent concomitant mental processes.

4 Section I of this discussion is presented as proof of relationship between aphasia and

psychoanalysis. Again, Davidson explains: “On Aphasia, the first link between

neurophysiology and psychoanalysis, will remain a monumental work in the development

of psychoanalysis.”

A similar case with complex nuances is presented in the essay, “The Neuro-

Psychoses of Defence”. The case concerns the unrequited affections of a young girl and

the young man who deceived her. The passage reads:

A girl had given her first impulsive affection to a man, and firmly believed that he

returned her love. In fact, she was wrong; the young man had a different motive

for visiting the house. Disappointments were not wanting. At first she defended

herself against them by effecting a hysterical conversion of the experiences in

question and thus preserved her belief that one day he would come and ask her

hand. But at the same time she felt unhappy and ill, because the conversion was

incomplete and because she was continually being met by fresh painful

impressions. Finally, in a state of great tension, she awaited his arrival on a

particular day, the day of a family celebration. But the day wore on and he did not

appear. When all the trains by which he could arrive had come and gone, she

passed into a state of hallucinatory confusion: he had arrived, she heard his voice

in the garden, she hurried down in her nightdress to receive him. From that time

on she lived for two months in a happy dream, whose content was that he was

there, always at her side, and that everything was as it had been before (before the

time of the disappointments which she had so laboriously fended off). Her hysteria

and her depression of spirits were overcome. During her illness she was silent

about the whole latter period of doubt and suffering; she was happy so long as she

was left undisturbed, and she broke out in fury only when some rule of conduct

insisted on by those around her hindered her in something which seemed to her to

follow quite logically from her blissful dream.

This passage is lengthy, so I will present it again, section by section, highlighting its

nuances and the relationship to Freud’s earlier work. The passage reads:

A girl had given her first impulsive affection to a man, and firmly believed that he

returned her love. In fact, she was wrong; the young man had a different motive

for visiting the house. Disappointments were not wanting. At first she defended

herself against them by effecting a hysterical conversion of the experiences in

question and thus preserved her belief that one day he would come and ask her

hand. (ibid).

When the alleged suitor did not satisfy the girl’s expectations, she deflected her

disappoints back unto herself and perhaps made herself believe that he was coy and

secretly pinned for her. However,

…at the same time she felt unhappy and ill, because the conversion was

incomplete and because she was continually being met by fresh painful

impressions. (ibid).

She was aware of the improbability of his affections and steadily grew frustrated because

of his neglect. She tried to convince herself that he yearned for her but she made herself

ill by nurturing contradictory impressions of his disinterest. Then,

Finally, in a state of great tension, she awaited his arrival on a particular day, the

day of a family celebration. But the day wore on and he did not appear. When all

the trains by which he could arrive had come and gone, she passed into a state of

hallucinatory confusion: he had arrived, she heard his voice in the garden, she

hurried down in her nightdress to receive him. (ibid).

The tempest of emotions erupted and she slipped into a condition seconde. Her illness

depended on her desire to believe in his affections. However her illness grew into an

independent group of beliefs and associations that ran parallel to observances of his

disinterest. When the associations matured and climax beyond a point of tension, she

entered into a hallucination and surrendered to her illness. She believed he came for her.

From that time on she lived for two months in a happy dream, whose content was

that he was there, always at her side, and that everything was as it had been before

(before the time of the disappointments which she had so laboriously fended off).

Her hysteria and her depression of spirits were overcome. During her illness she

was silent about the whole latter period of doubt and suffering; she was happy so

long as she was left undisturbed, and she broke out in fury only when some rule

of conduct insisted on by those around her hindered her in something which

seemed to her to follow quite logically from her blissful dream. (ibid).

Her hallucination lasted two months. She behaved as if she was convinced of his

presence and companionship. Though she remained silent about her times of sorrow and

disappointment, she erupted with anger when anyone questioned her beliefs. Her ability

to maintain her hallucination and her anger simultaneously means her original state lay

dormant and ran parallel to the associations generating her hallucination. Thus she

exemplifies the dependent concomitant and the condition seconde.

The two cases presented above demonstrate that Freud’s work on aphasia

blossomed within his work on psychoanalysis. His theory of dependent concomitants

generated the flourishing of his theory on the condition seconde. The possibility of the

dependent concomitant and the condition seconde facilitate an explanation of the cases

above.

II(ii)

Freud developed a theory of parallel associations, or condition seconde, by

considering the possibility of dependent concomitants within On Aphasia. In the same

text, as discussed in Section I (ii), Freud came to focus on the role of words as the

functional unit of speech as well. His focus on words and associations informed his

treatment of hysteria and neuroses. Freud says:

In our ‘Preliminary Communication’ we reported how, in the course of our

investigation into the aetiology of hysterical symptoms, we also came upon a

therapeutic method which seemed to us of practical importance. For ‘we found, to

our great surprise at first, that each individual hysterical symptom immediately

and permanently disappeared when we had succeeded in bringing clearly to light

the memory of the event by which it was provoked and in arousing its

accompanying affect, and when the patient had described that event in the greatest

possible detail and had put the affect into words’. (“The Psychotherapy of

Hysteria”, Studies on Hysteria).

Freud revered the power of words and the ability of articulation to alleviate patients of

their symptoms and suffering. Speaking relieved patients. Their symptoms were assuaged

as they articulated traumatic experiences. Patients were then able to re-examine

memories, re-establish their understanding of the events and form new associations.

This therapeutic process is elaborate and sometimes difficult. As seen in the cases

above, the patient must have suffered a trauma of a “distressing nature, calculated to

arouse the affects of shame, of self-reproach and of psychical pain, and the feeling of

being harmed… of a kind that one would prefer not to have experienced, that one would

rather forget.” (ibid).

Then the patient must have developed a defense against the effects the traumatic

experience. Though the patient is seeking help for hysteria or neuroses, the patient is

unaware that she has tried to repress or expel impressions. She is unaware that her

defense was her first response to the event and the catalyst for the symptoms for which

she seeks treatment.

With an eye to the dependent concomitant and condition seconde, Freud

proclaims, “that trace [of the experience] must be there.” Yet when he “[endeavors] to

direct the patient's attention to” the event, he encounters resistance equal to force with

which she developed her defense. (ibid).

Freud must then find means with which to treat taciturn and recalcitrant patients.

To progress beyond the boundaries of resistance, Freud applies pressure to patients’

forehead and asks them to recall single words or pictures associated with the traumatic

event. Freud says:

I inform the patient that, a moment later, I shall apply pressure to his forehead, and

I assure him that, all the time the pressure lasts, he will see before him a

recollection in the form of a picture or will have it in his thoughts in the form of an

idea occurring to him; and I pledge him to communicate this picture or idea to me,

whatever it may be. He is not to keep it to himself because he may happen to think

it is not what is wanted, not the right thing, or because it would be too

disagreeable for him to say it. There is to be no criticism of it, no reticence, either

for emotional reasons or because it is judged unimportant. Only in this manner can

we find what we are in search of, but in this manner we shall find it infallibly.

(ibid).

This technique allows Freud to find words with which to begin or continue treatment.

Now surrendered to the therapeutic process, Freud can sustain a dialogue with the patient.

This dialogue employs words as the functional unit of speech and allows the physician to

reveal and reshape the patient’s associations. Thus the condition seconde may dissolve

and the patient’s original state of health, which lay dormant as a dependant concomitant,

may resurface and evolve into new associations that are free or hysterical or neurotic

symptoms.

To conclude this section on the treatment of words within psychoanalysis I will

present the following example. Within “The Psychotherapy of Hysteria”, from Studies on

Hysteria, Freud recounts:

The revelations which one obtains through the procedure of pressing

occasionally appear in a very remarkable form and in circumstances which make

the assumption of there being an unconscious intelligence even more tempting.

Thus I remember a lady who had suffered for many years from obsessions and

phobias and who referred me to her childhood for the genesis of her illness but

was also quite unable to say what might be to blame for it. She was frank and

intelligent and she put up only a remarkably small conscious resistance. (I may

remark in parenthesis that the psychical mechanism of obsessions has a very great

deal of internal kinship with hysterical symptoms and that the technique of

analysis is the same for both of them.) When I asked this lady whether she had

seen anything or had any recollection under the pressure of my hand, she replied:

‘Neither the one nor the other, but a word has suddenly occurred to me.’ ‘A single

word?’ ‘Yes, but it sounds too silly.’ ‘Say it all the same.’ ‘Concierge.’ ‘Nothing

else?’ ‘No.’ I pressed a. second time and once more an isolated word shot through

her mind: ‘Night-gown.’ I saw now that this was a new sort of method of

answering, and by pressing repeatedly I brought out what seemed to be a

meaningless series of words: ‘Concierge’—‘night-gown’—‘bed’—‘town’—

‘farm-cart.’ ‘What does all this mean?’ I asked. She reflected for a moment and

the following thought occurred to her: ‘It must be the story that has just come into

my head. When I was ten years old and my next elder sister was twelve, she went

raving mad one night and had to be tied down and taken into the town on a farm-

cart. I remember perfectly that it was the concierge who overpowered her and

afterwards went with her to the asylum as well.’ We pursued this method of

investigation and our oracle produced another series of words, which, though we

were not able to interpret all of them, made it possible to continue this story and

lead on from it to another one. Soon, moreover, the meaning of this reminiscence

became clear. Her sister's illness had made such a deep impression on her because

the two of them shared a secret; they slept in one room and on a particular night

they had both been subjected to sexual assaults by a certain man. The mention of

this sexual trauma in the patient's childhood revealed not only the origin of her

first obsessions but also the trauma which subsequently produced the pathogenic

effects.

The peculiarity of this case lay only in the emergence of isolated key-

words which we had to work into sentences; for the appearance of

disconnectedness and irrelevance which characterized the words emitted in this

oracular fashion applies equally to the complete ideas and scenes which are

normally produced under my pressure. When these are followed up, it invariably

turns out that the apparently disconnected reminiscences are closely linked in

thought and that they lead quite straight to the pathogenic factor we are looking

for. For this reason I am glad to recall a case of analysis in which my confidence

in the products of pressure were first put to a hard test but afterwards brilliantly

justified.

The case above is important in two respects. First it demonstrates the process by which

Freud employed his technique. Freud applied a gentle pressure and welcomed her

succinct descriptions of the traumatic memory. Second it demonstrates the relationship

between aphasia and psychoanalysis. In On Aphasia Freud considers the ordinary

circumstances in which words are misused. There, he looked to words as signifiers of

disorientation in aphasiacs and laymen. In the psychoanalytic case above, his same

attention to words allows him to reorient the patient and free her of her ailments.

III

AN OBJECTION

There is at least one philosophical objection to the theory of associations from

whence Freud derives the theories of a dependent concomitant, a condition seconde and

the word as the functional unit of speech. The theory of associations is justified by the

work of John Stuart Mill. In “The Unconscious”, Freud writes:

A word, however, acquires its meaning by being linked to an ‘object-

presentation’, at all events if we restrict ourselves to a consideration of

substantives. The object-presentation itself is once again a complex of associations

made up of the greatest variety of visual, acoustic, tactile, kinaesthetic and other

presentations. Philosophy tells us that an object-presentation consists in nothing

more than this—that the appearance of there being a ‘thing’ to whose various

‘attributes’ these sense-impressions bear witness is merely due to the fact that, in

enumerating the sense-impressions which we have received from an object, we

also assume the possibility of there being a large number of further impressions in

the same chain of associations (J. S. Mill). (Appendix C).

For Mills’ claims to be true, there must be subject who receives and interprets or

assimilates sense impressions. There are philosophers who would refute tenets of Mills’

theories. Wittgenstein, who is invoked in the epigraph, would refute the tenets of

subjectivity. Wittgenstein writes:

If I wrote a book called The World as I found it, I should have to include a report

on my body, and should have to say which parts were subordinate to my will, and

which were not, etc.. this being a method of isolating the subject, or rather of

showing that in an important sense there is no subject; for it alone could not be

mentioned in that book.- (5.631. Tractatus Logico-philosophicus).

Wittgenstein argues vehemently against subjectivity. Without the benefits of subjectivity,

Freud’s work is vulnerable to grave assault as there would not be a vessel who

assimilates impressions and composes associations.

Though a rich discussion on subjectivity could be had, it would exceed the bounds

the current discussion. Therefore the matter of subjectivity must be set aside. However,

Wittgenstein concerns himself with words, which are fundamental to Freud’s works.

Wittgenstein writes, “you learnt the concept ‘pain’ when you learned language.” (384.

Philosophical Investigations). Wittgenstein and Freud both are concerned with words and

pain. Thus it is a worthwhile endeavor to consider Freud’s focus on words and

associations as a medium for accessing our greatest worries and pains.

IV

WORDS, LANGUAGE, SYMPATHY

I was compelled to study the value of words in Freud’s theoretical and clinical

writings because I suspected that words allowed Freud to build a humane connection with

ailing souls. My suspicions are confirmed in On Aphasia, in which Freud declares the

word to be the functional unit of speech, the medium that determines and reflects the state

of our associations.

I believe Freud labored over his work on aphasia and psychoanalysis because he

cared to heal to the sick. In “The Psychotherapy of Hysteria”, Studies on Hysteria, he

writes:

The procedure is laborious and time-consuming for the physician. It presupposes

great interest in psychological happenings, but personal concern for the patients as

well. I cannot imagine brining myself to delve into the physical mechanism of

hysteria in anyone who struck me as low-minded and repellent, and who, on

closer acquaintance, would not be capable of arousing human sympathy… One

works to the best of one's power, as an elucidator (where ignorance has given rise

to fear), as a teacher, as the representative of a freer or superior view of the world,

as a father confessor who gives absolution, as it were, by a continuance of his

sympathy and respect after the confession has been made. One tries to give the

patient human assistance…

This is the sense in which Freud allows the patient to be right as defined in the epigraph

of this discussion. Studying the word as the functional unit of speech allows Freud to

delve in the mind of the sick and afflicted. Once there, he understands their pains,

sufferings and pathologies. He diagnoses their obsessions and hysterias. He conceives of

a sense in which is right for them to cry out in pain.

To honor of the innovative spirit with Freud labored, this discussion concludes

with the words of Richard Fleming, who writes extensively on ethics.

Not knowing how to mean or say what we wish naturally numbs us, reintroduces

silence, and places the necessity of beginning again before us. However,

remembering the fact and uses of language that make such a life possible can

offer understanding and perspective.

References and Citations

Breuer, J. and Freud, S. (1893). On The Psychical Mechanism of Hysterical

Phenomena. The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of

Sigmund Freud, Volume II (1893-1895): Studies on Hysteria, 1-17.

Psychoanalytic Electronic Publishing. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.

Davison, C. (1955). On Aphasia (A Critical Study). Psychoanal. Q., 24:115-119.

Psychoanalytic Electronic Publishing. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.

Fleming, Richard. Evil and Silence. Boulder, CO: Paradigm, 2010. Print.

Freud, S. (1893). The Psychotherapy of Hysteria from Studies on Hysteria. The

Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud,

Volume II (1893-1895): Studies on Hysteria, 253-305. Psychoanalytic Electronic

Publishing. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.

Freud, S. (1894). Obsessions and Phobias. The Standard Edition of the Complete

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Analytic Publications, 69-82. Psychoanalytic Electronic Publishing. Web. 3 Nov.

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Freud, S. (1894). The Neuro-Psychoses of Defence. The Standard Edition of the

Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume III (1893-1899): Early

Psycho-Analytic Publications, 41-61. Psychoanalytic Electronic Publishing. Web.

3 Nov. 2012.

Freud, S. (1915). The Unconscious. The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological

Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume XIV (1914-1916): On the History of the

Psycho-Analytic Movement, Papers on Metapsychology and Other Works, 159-

215. Psychoanalytic Electronic Publishing. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig, and G. E. M. Anscombe. "§289." Philosophical Investigations:

The English Text of the Third Edition. New York: Prentice Hall, 1958.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig, David Pears, and Brian McGuinness. Tractatus Logico-

philosophicus. London: Routledge, 2001.