Abstract
The hysteric is the iconic figure of psychoanalysis: Her symptoms fed the theoretical insight of Charcot, Breuer and Freud; they inspired the Surrealists as the source of a new creative madness and independent femininity; for Lacan, she forms the model representing the true quest for knowledge; for Baudrillard, she constitutes the model for rootless consumer desire. The hysteric provides a model for critics as the embodiment of the wrongs of psychoanalysis, her treatment a testament to forceful misreadings of the symptoms exhibited by young and vulnerable women in the interests of male power, some of whom defiantly refused its message.
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Notes
Flanagan, Caitlin, (2012). Hysteria and the Teenage Girl. Sunday Review, Opinion Pages, New York Times, 29 January 2012. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/opinion/sunday/adolescent-girl-hysteria.html. Accessed May 2012.
Duell, Mark (2011). Arrests, pepper spray, gunshots, brawls and doors pulled off hinges: Chaos at stores across U.S. as thousands of shoppers scramble for new Nike Air Jordans. Mail Online, 24 December. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2078134/Chaos-U-S-stores-thousands-shoppers-scramble-new-Nike-Air-Jordans.html. Accessed May 2012.
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© 2013 John Desmond
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Desmond, J. (2013). Hysteria. In: Psychoanalytic Accounts of Consuming Desire. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137289087_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137289087_8
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