The relation between individual and society has been a main topic across the history of social sciences. The aim of this paper is to show the originality of Sigmund Freud's ideas about the topic, through a comparative analysis with the approaches of the socio-anthropological currents of the school of Culture and Personality (Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, Ralph Linton) and of French Sociology (Emile Durkheim, Marcel Mauss and Claude Lévi-Strauss). Our research was based on a bibliographical analysis of some key socio-anthropological texts on this debate, as well as the relevant Freudian production. The interpretation of the Freudian material was organized according to three topics: a) the affirmation of the symbolic determination of symptoms, b) the methodological erasure of the individual society distinction, and c) the theorization of a mythical, transindividual and transhistorical efficacy. We conclude by emphasizing the contributions of Freud's thought to the discussion: the affirmation of symbolic determination offers the conditions for overcoming the externality relation between the pole of the individual and that of society, and the consequent rejection of a specular relationship between the two.
Piñones-Rivera, C., Galdames-del Solar, R., & Mansilla, M. A. (2018). From the unconscious to the symbolic function: the originality of Freud’s contribution to the individual-society debate. Cinta De Moebio. Revista De Epistemología De Ciencias Sociales, (62), 155–169. Retrieved from https://rchd.uchile.cl/index.php/CDM/article/view/49458