Freud’s Contribution

Abstract Sigmund Freud is considered the first psychiatrist. The oedipal complex (see Chapter 1) is a central tenet of his psychoanalytical theory. Many plays illustrate this complex, as it is an essential feature of family dynamics. Freud, aware of the basic themes of childhood sexuality, named the “Oedipus complex” after Sophocles’s play, Oedipus Rex. Freud also called the childhood aspect of female sexuality, in which the girl wants to eliminate her mother and marry her father, the Oedipus complex. It took Jung to consider another Sophocles play, Electra, and name the female oedipal complex the “Electra complex,” although now we use the Oedipus complex to include females and males alike.