Definition
Penis envy was first described by Sigmund Freud as a necessary step toward the development of female gender identity, in which young girls exposed to a naked male body believed themselves to be castrated boys and wished for a penis of their own, leading eventually to the Oedipus complex and the development of normal femininity. In adult women, Freud saw penis envy as the source of neurosis and an insurmountable obstacle to psychological cure. Analysts both during Freud’s time and today have challenged this formulation and developed alternative conceptualizations of penis envy and female psychological development.
Freud
Penis envy was first described by Sigmund Freud in 1908. He subsequently expanded on it several times, laboring throughout his career to develop a cohesive theory of female development. Freud believed all children were born bisexual in orientation but male in gender identity. He noted that...
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References
Freud, S. (1923). The infantile genital organization (An interpolation into the theory of sexuality). In The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud: The ego and the id and other works, 19(1923–1925). The Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psychoanalysis, London.
Freud, S. (1925). Some psychical consequences of the anatomical distinction between the sexes. In The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud, volume XIX (1923–1925): The ego and the id and other works. London: The Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psychoanalysis.
Freud, S. (1931). Female sexuality. In The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud, volume XXI (1927–1931): The future of an illusion, civilization and its discontents, and other works. London: The Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psychoanalysis.
Freud, S. (1937). Analysis terminable and interminable. In The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud, volume XXIII (1937–1939): Moses and monotheism, an outline of psycho-analysis and other works. London: The Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psychoanalysis.
Horney, K. (1924). On the genesis of the castration complex in women. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 5, 50–65.
Horney, K. (1926). The flight from womanhood. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 7, 324–329.
Klein, M. (1932). The psycho-analysis of children. London: The Hogarth Press.
Tyson, P. (1989). Infantile sexuality, gender identity, and obstacles to oedipal progression. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, 37(4), 1051–1069.
Further Reading
Dahl, E. K. (1996). The concept of penis envy revisited: A child analyst listens to adult women. Psychoanalytic Study of the Child, 51, 303–326.
Fliegel, Z. O. (1973). Feminine psychosexual development in Freudian theory: A historical reconstruction. The Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 42(3), 385–408.
Holmes, L. (2009). Masculine and feminine: Differentiation and integration. Modern Psychoanalysis, 34(2), 1–15.
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Gersick, S. (2017). Penis Envy. 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_616-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_616-1
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