Definition
A concept of a role or personality present in the collective unconscious of all humans that is often expressed through dreams and common cultural narratives such as religion and mythology.
Introduction
Many of Carl Gustav Jung’s contributions to the field of psychology remain popular today. The idea of being in touch with one’s masculine/feminine side contains seeds of Jung’s anima/animus concept. Jung also articulated his concepts of introverted and extroverted personality types, ideas that led to the popular Meyers-Briggs test (Jung 1923; Myers and McCaulley 1989). One idea that remains more obscure is his concept of the collective unconscious and its archetypes, specifically the archetype of the self.
What About Freud?
Jung’s concept of the unconscious differs from Freud’s well-known ideas about the topic. Jung and Freud entertained different ideas about the...
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References
Edinger, E. F. (1996). In D. A. Wesley (Ed.), The Aion lectures: Exploring the self in C.G. Jung’s Aion. Toronto: Inner City Books.
Freud, S. (1976). In J. Strachey (Ed.), The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud (Vol. 15). New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Jung, C. G. (1923). Psychological types. London: Routledge Kegan Paul.
Jung, C. G. (1933). Dream analysis in its practical application. In Modern man in search of a soul (pp. 1–31) (W. S. Dell & C. F. Baynes, Trans.). London, England: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner and Co.
Jung, C. G. (1970). Psychology and religion: West and east. In G. Adler & R. F. C. Hull (Eds. & Trans.), Collected works of C. G. Jung (Vol. 11). Retrieved from: https://ebookcentral-proquest-com.vortex3.uco.edu/lib/ucokebooks/detail.action?docID=1573471.
Jung, C. G. (1979). Aion: Researches into the phenomenology of the self (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), Collected works of C. G. Jung (Vol. 9, part 2). Retrieved from: https://ebookcentral-proquest-com.vortex3.uco.edu.
Jung, C. G. (1981). Archetypes and the collective unconscious (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.). In H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler, & W. McGuire (Eds.), Collected works of C. G. Jung (Vol. 9, part 1). Retrieved from https://ebookcentral-proquest-com.vortex3.uco.edu.
Myers, I. B., & McCaulley, M. H. (1989). Manual: A guide to the development and use of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Palo Alto: Consulting Psychologists Press.
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Kilhoffer, D. (2019). Self (Jungian Archetype). In: Zeigler-Hill, V., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_1999-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_1999-1
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