Starting with the Spring 2024 Issue of the Journal of Psychohistory, we began publishing Jay Gonen’s manuscript of his fifth and final book, written before he died in 2022 at the age of 88, titled The World and the Self in Early 20th Century Literature. We will be publishing all seven chapters of the book serially — in consecutive issues of the journal. In this issue, we will be publishing Chapter 6 (Part 1).
Articles
Beating the Mother Out of Them: The Origins of Toxic Masculinity, Kenneth Alan Adams
ABSTRACT: To become men, boys must disidentify from their mothers. Male jealousy and resentment of women’s procreative power drive their efforts to dominate and control women and constitute the basis for male specialization in aggression and the infliction of death. Father absence and corporal punishment ensure that boys’ disidentification with their mothers will be more traumatic, which, combined with contemporary politics, forms the basis of contemporary toxic masculinity.
The Sentience of Maga Cruelty, Seth Allcorn
ABSTRACT: The reelection of Donald Trump supported by MAGA loyalists has resulted in the feared loss of guardrails that moderated his actions during his first presidency. Loyalty to him and MAGA is a prerequisite for participation in his second administration. There has developed a common theme in his many uninhibited actions: cruelty toward anyone opposed to him and MAGA—as well as immigrants who contaminate the blood of white Americans.
Key Words: Cruelty, Sadism, Sentience groups, MAGA, Psychosocial analysis, President Trump
Transgenerational Traumas and Their Abatement in an Agricultural Community, Peter Petschauer
ABSTRACT: Trauma in agricultural settings has been rarely investigated because most research is carried out in urban settings where the majority of observers and analysts reside. With the assistance of several lead investigators, this paper attempts to enter this lacuna with insights into the transgenerational trauma in villages, efforts to mitigate it in the past, and modern breakthroughs to less traumatic family and community life.
Key Words: Agricultural communities, Medieval-High German, today Bavarian dialect German, trauma, transgenerational trauma, South Tyrol/Alto Adige, Dolomite Mountains, Afers/Eores, WWI, WWII, van der Kolk, Vogt, pilgrimages, Vatican II.
Jacques Lacan: A Psychohistorical Perspective, David Lotto
ABSTRACT: This paper examines selective aspects of Lacan’s life, writings, lectures, and clinical work, as well as briefly exploring some of the sources of his popularity and influence. The connections of some of his theoretical concepts to Catholic theology and his Catholic upbringing are discussed. It is suggested that some of his hostility toward American Ego Psychology may have a component related to his personal analysis with Rudolf Loewenstein.
Book Excerpt
Louis-Ferdinand Céline: Individual Fate Instead of Group Destiny Chapter 6 (Part 1), Jay Y. Gonen
The First World War, which raged during the years 1914-1918, was a watershed event in history. Among other huge changes in the political face of Europe, it brought an end to the German, Russian, Austro-Hungarian, and Ottoman Empires. Because Europe after the war was so fundamentally different from pre-war Europe, it is sometimes thought that the nineteenth century, which nominally ended in the year 1900, actually ended during the war years. …. History was to show that this noble hope was premature, and eventually the war was renamed as the First World War.
Psychohistorical Perspectives: Review Essay
The Sleepless, Shaking, Raving and Twitching Dictator, Robert M. Kaplan Hitler’s Maladies and Their Impact on World War II: A Behavioral Neurologist’s View, by Tom Hutton.
Of the three twentieth-century dictators, who among them killed many millions of people, it is still Adolf Hitler who attracts the most attention. Books on his life continue to pour out, some of which focus on his health and mental state. This is no surprise. In addition to initiating a European war that killed over 50 million people, Hitler ran a genocide with assembly-line gas chambers to murder the hapless victims. His ranting diatribes to an enraptured German public left others wondering about his sanity. Rumours abounded: he chewed carpets, was urinated on by women for sexual purposes and only had one testicle.
Psychohistorical Perspectives: Poetry
Sub Specie Aeternitatis, Donald Mender Ponce de Leon, Donald Mender
Thrill, Howard F. Stein